Download World War II - Chandler Unified School District

US History Unit #14
Closure Question #1: Why did Roosevelt support a “Europe
first” strategy even though it was Japan that had first attacked
the United States? (At least 1 sentence)


The Axis Powers never had a coordinated strategy to defeat the
Allies. Germany, Italy, and Japan shared common enemies but
nurtured individual dreams. Hitler wanted to dominate Europe and
eliminate “inferior” peoples. Mussolini harbored dreams of an Italian
empire stretching from the eastern Adriatic to East Africa. Tojo
sought Japanese control of the Western Pacific and Asia.
The Allies shared more unified goals. Roosevelt, Churchill, and
Stalin considered Germany the most dangerous enemy. None felt
Japan or Italy posed a serious long-term threat. Only Germany had
the resources to bomb Britain, fight U.S. and British navies on the
Atlantic, and invade the Soviet Union across a 1,200-mile front.
Thus, although their ultimate goal was to fight and win a two-front
war, the Allies agreed to pursue a “Europe First” strategy. Until
Hitler was defeated, the Pacific would be a secondary theater of
war.
Battle of Stalingrad

The True turning point of WWII in Europe; Breaking their prior treaty,
Germany invaded Russia in 1941 but was stopped at Stalingrad by the
bitter cold of the Russian winter and the superior number of Russian
soldiers, surrendering on January 31, 1943.
Erwin Rommel

(1899-1941) Nicknamed “The Desert Fox”, Rommel is considered one of the
most talented tactical German Generals, but was also known for his
humane treatment of prisoners of war and civilians. He led German forces
in North Africa until 1943, then commanded German forces against the
Allied invasion on D-Day. However, in 1944 Rommel was accused of being
involved in a plot to assassinate Hitler and was executed.
Dwight Eisenhower

(1890-1969) Commander of successful American invasions in North
Africa & Italy; Eisenhower became Supreme Commander of all Allied
forces in Europe in 1944, directing the D-Day invasion of Europe. “Ike”
went on to serve as President of the USA after the war from 1952 to 1960.
George S. Patton Jr.

(1885-1945) Following Eisenhower’s advancement to Supreme Commander,
Paton was given command of all US mechanized units (tanks) in Europe.
Paton combined innovative tank tactics with single-minded devotion to duty
and victory, earning the nickname of “Blood and Guts”.
Unconditional Surrender

Giving up completely without any concessions; Following Allied victory
in North Africa, Pres. Roosevelt declared that the Allies would accept
nothing other than unconditional surrender from the Axis powers,
removing the possibility of a negotiated peace between the two sides.
Closure Question #2: Was the Allied invasion of Italy a
success? Give at least 2 reasons for your answer?
Ike hoped to trap Axis forces on Sicily, but they escaped to the Italian
mainland. Still, the 38-day campaign achieved important results. It gave the
Allies complete control of the western Mediterranean, paved the way for an
invasion of Italy, and ended the rule of Benito Mussolini. On September 3,
1943, Italy surrendered to the Allies and five weeks later declared war on
Germany. But Hitler was not through with Italy. After a small German airborne
force rescued Mussolini from a mountaintop fortress, Hitler installed him as
head of a puppet state in northern Italy. In the south, German military forces
continued the fight against the Allies.
 The invasion of Italy was a slow, grinding slog. Italy was crisscrossed with
mountains and rivers. Heavy rains and mountain snows made combat difficult
and painful. Men fought in ankle-deep mud. In the mountains, where tanks
and heavy artillery were useless, Allied forces depended on mules to haul
supplies up slippery and steep roads. To make matters worse, the Germans
occupied the best defensive positions. Fighting continued into 1945. The Allies
won battles but none were important enough to alter the basic German
defensive policy.

Saturation Bombing / Strategic Bombing
Saturation Bombing – Military strategy of using planes to drop massive
amounts of bombs on a city or town to inflict maximum damage;
Beginning in 1942 British planes flew from France by night to conduct
Saturation Bombing attacks on German cities trying to break the will of
the German people to continue the fight.
 Strategic Bombing – Military strategy of using planes to bomb specific
political and industrial targets to weaken a nation’s capacity to make
war; American planes targeted specific German factories and
government centers in day time attacks.

Tuskegee Airmen

First African-American air fighter squadron which played a key role in the
American bombing campaign against Germany, escorting bombers &
protecting them from enemy fighter pilots. In more than 1,500 missions
over enemy territory, the Tuskegee Airmen didn’t lose a single bomber.
Battle of Midway

June 4th, 1942; Considered the turning point of the war in the Pacific, the U.S.
Navy, led by Admiral Chester Nimitz, successfully defended the Midway
Island, a key American Naval base in the Central Pacific, from Japanese
attack, sinking 4 Japanese aircraft carriers and ending Japanese threats to the
American west coast.

What Yamamoto did not realize was that Admiral Chester Nimitz knew the Japanese plans. Navy code
breakers had intercepted the Japanese plans. To meet the expected assault, Nimitz sent his only
available aircraft carriers to Midway. The Japanese navy was stretched out across more than a
thousand miles, from the Aleutians to well west of Midway. American forces were all concentrated
near Midway.
American
M-1 Rifle

Weapons of World War II
German
Luger
While new tank, small arms, and submarine technology played an
important role in World War 2, by far the most important advancement in
weaponry took place in the skies. Faster planes with the ability to carry
heavier and more devastating explosives caused heavy damage to civilian
and military targets. Several of Europe’s largest cities dealt with saturation
bombing, such as London during the Battle of Britain and Dresden and
Berlin during the closing years of the war in Europe. However, the greatest
example of advances in air and explosive technology can be seen in the
dropping of the Atomic Bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan.
Japanese Mitsubishi
Ki-67 Hiryu
American B-17
“Flying Fortress”
German Arado
Ar 234 “Blitz”
German Type
XXI U-Boat
Closure Assignment #1

1.
2.
3.
Answer the following questions based on what you
have learned from Chapter 24, Section 1:
Why did Roosevelt support a “Europe first”
strategy even though it was Japan that had first
attacked the United States? (At least 1 sentence)
Was the Allied invasion of Italy a success? Give at
least 2 reasons for your answer?
How does the Battle of Midway illustrate the
importance of intelligence gathering and
espionage in modern warfare? (Explain in at least
1 sentence)
Rosie the Riveter

Popular image during the WWII era of a muscular, determined
female worker. Rosie came to symbolically represent the tens of
thousands of women who worked in industrial, farming, and clerical
jobs to support the American war effort.
A. Philip Randolph / Executive Order 8802
A. Philip Randolph – African American labor union leader who, along
with many others, stressed the need for a double victory – victory
against fascism abroad and victory against discrimination at home.
 Executive Order 8802 (June 1941) – Fearing the possibility of a huge
march for civil rights in Washington D.C. led by Randolph, President
Roosevelt issued this order, establishing fair hiring practices in any
job funded with government money and established the Fair
Employment Practices Committee to enforce these requirements.

Bracero Program

Partnership between the United States and Mexico through which
Mexican laborers were brought to work on American farms to boost
wartime production of crops. Through this program several hundred
thousand Mexicans legally migrated to the United States during the
1940s.
Closure Question #2: How were the causes of the Detroit
race riots and the Los Angeles Zoot Suit Riots similar?
(At least 1 sentence)
In the summer of 1943, wartime migration led to racial violence in a number of cities.
The worst occurred in Detroit, Michigan, where conflict erupted over the construction
of housing for black workers drawn north to defense plants. Finally, some 100,000
whites and blacks broke into scattered fights at a city park. By the next morning, fullscale riots erupted in which 34 people were killed. Federal troops ended the
violence, but nobody found a real resolution to the city’s problems.
 Mexican Americans had long dealt with similar tensions. Few had mastered the
English language, and many languished in slums while struggling to find work. A
violent incident highlighted the problems. In the Los Angeles area, many Mexican
and Mexican American youths dressed in stylish “zoot suits” with baggy pants and
long jackets. In June 1943, mobs of off-duty sailors roamed through the Mexican
sections of Los Angeles, attacking “zooters.” Once the fighting ended, police
arrested the zoot-suited victims, not their attackers. After the riots, an indignant
Governor Earl Warren formed a committee to investigate the causes of the outbreak
and demanded that the guilty parties be punished. Although the committee blamed
the lack of sufficient recreation for the violence, long-brewing racial tensions acted
as the true spark.

Internment

Temporary imprisonment of members of a specific group; During
WWII Japanese Americans living near the west coast were forced
to relocate to internment camps due to fears that they might help
the Japanese if a Japanese invasion of the west coast took place.
Korematsu v. United States

1944 Supreme Court case filed by Japanese Americans who argued
that internment was an unconstitutional restriction of their rights.
The Court ruled that internment was justified for security reasons.
442nd Regimental Combat Team

Military unit complete made up of native-born Japanese
Americans which fought in Italy and became the most
decorated military unit in American history. The performance
of the 442nd helped counter the notion that Japanese
Americans were not loyal citizens.
Office of War Information (OWI)

Government organization which worked closely with the media
(radio, newspapers, movies) to encourage support of the war
effort. The OWI tried to spotlight the common needs of Americans
and the importance of the struggle against dictatorship while
downplaying racial tension and crime in the USA.
American Fashion
during World War Two

One casualty of the American war effort were the flowing
dresses and elaborate make-up usage of American
women. With the rationing of cloth, powder, and other
resources necessary for the production of traditional
clothing and make-up, women had to simplify their
appearance. Dresses that did not require as much cloth
(such as those below) became fashionable, as did a more
“natural” style of make-up.
Dorothy Lamour's sarong and
Veronica Lake's peek-a-boo
hairstyle were two iconic images
of style during World War II.
Wool Women’s Bathing Suits
Closure Assignment #2

1.
2.
3.
Answer the following questions based on what you
have learned from Chapter 24, Section 2:
Predict two possible consequences for wartime
women factory workers when men began to return
from overseas after the war.
How were the causes of the Detroit race riots and
the Los Angeles Zoot Suit Riots similar? (At least
1 sentence)
Do you think the federal government was justified
in limiting individual freedom by imposing wage
and price controls and by rationing during
wartime? Why or Why not? (At least 1 sentence)
Closure Question #1: Summarize the arguments for and
against an Allied invasion of France before 1944. (At
least 2 sentences)
In 1942 and 1943, the Allies turned back the Axis advances. In the last two years of
the war, 1944 and 1945, they delivered the final, crushing blow. They attacked
Germany from the west and east, and the United States advanced across the
Pacific to the doorstep of Japan. In the process, Americans created a new form of
weapons that would change both warfare and global politics. Throughout 1943,
Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin squabbled over when they would start a second
front in France. Up to that point, Soviet troops had done most of the fighting in
Europe, Stalin insisted that Britain and the United States carry more of the military
burden by attacking Germany in the west, thereby forcing Germany to divide its
troops.
 Roosevelt sympathized with Stalin’s position, but Churchill hesitated and delayed.
Recalling the slaughter of British troops on the Western Front in World War I, he was
not anxious to see history repeat itself. He argued that the German U-boat presence
was too great in the English Channel and that the Allies needed more landing craft,
more equipment, and better-trained soldiers. In November 1943, Roosevelt and
Churchill traveled to Teheran, Iran, for their first face-to-face meeting with Stalin.
Churchill continued to voice reservations about a cross-channel invasion, but FDR
sided with Stalin. Reluctantly, Churchill agreed. After years of war, British and
American soldiers would invade France and begin their march toward Germany.

D-Day

(June 6, 1944) The first day of the Allied invasion of western Europe;
American, British, Canadian and Polish troops landed on the northern
coast of France (Normandy), suffering heavy casualties but eventually
overrunning German defenses and beginning the push east to Germany.
Battle of the Bulge

(December 1944) The last desperate counterattack by the German army
against the Allies on the western front; German tanks barreled through the
Ardennes forest, retaking several towns before being stopped by American
forces at the Belgian town of Bastogne and pushed back into Germany.
The Death of Adolf Hitler

By late April 1945 all German armies were in full retreat, falling back into Berlin.
While Americans pushed across the Rhine River from the West, the Soviet
Army was the first to reach Berlin on April 26. As the end drew near, Hitler’s
exhibited extreme bi-polar behavior, at times reconciled to his death (preparing
a last will and testament in which he left all of his possessions to the Nazi Party
and blamed Jews for World War II) and at other times furious, calling for armies
to defend him that no longer existed and ordering the arrest and execution of
supposed traitors. On April 28th near midnight Hitler married his long-time
mistress Eva Braun and enjoyed a last party with his generals in the Nazi Party
headquarters. Two days later, Hitler and his wife committed suicide. Eva died
by poisoning while Hitler shot himself in his right temple. He had left explicit
orders for their bodies to be burned after hearing of the Italians treatment of the
corpse of Mussolini. On May 1st, what was left of the Nazi leadership
surrendered to the Soviets.
Harry S. Truman

C
(1884-1972) Vice-President to FDR, Truman became president following
Roosevelt’s death in April 1945 and served until January 1953. Truman
received Germany’s surrender in May 1945 & Japan’s surrender in August
1945, and was the first President of the Cold War era, but he is best known
for making the decision to use the Atomic Bomb against Japan.
Island Hopping

U.S. strategy in the Pacific against Japan; The Navy captured
some Japanese-held islands while ignoring others in a steady
path toward Japan from 1942 to 1945.
Kamikaze

“Divine Wind”; Japanese suicide-bomber pilots who
deliberately crashed their planes full of jet fuel into American
ships in the Pacific during the late stages of WWII.
Navajo Code Talkers

Navajo radio operators recruited specifically by the U.S. Navy who used a
code based on their own language – which was a mystery to the Japanese
– to send critical messages from island to island in the Pacific. The code
was never broken. The Navy kept the service of the Navajos secret until the
1980s, in case their services were needed in another conflict.
Albert Einstein / J. Robert Oppenheimer
Albert Einstein – The world’s most famous scientist & German by birth, in
1942 Einstein signed a letter advising President Roosevelt about the need
to develop an atomic weapon before the Axis powers did so. Einstein’s
influence led FDR to invest several billion dollars of tax money into the
Manhattan Project, the code name for the program to develop the atomic
bomb.
 J. Robert Oppenheimer – Physicist who led the scientific side of the
Manhattan Project, working with top scientists from around the world,
many of which were European refugees. Their research culminated in the
first successful test of an atomic weapon, which took place near
Alamogordo, New Mexico on July 16, 1945.

Hiroshima / Nagasaki
Hiroshima (August 6, 1945) – Site of the first atomic-bomb attack. The
bomb exploded at 9:14 A.M. By 9:16 A.M. more than 60,000 of
Hiroshima’s 344,000 residents were dead or missing. An estimated total
of 140,000 residents were killed by the blast and the radiation poisoning
that followed, and 69% of the city’s buildings were completely destroyed.
 Nagasaki (August 9, 1945) – Second atomic-bomb attack site. 35,000
were killed by the blast, with a total of nearly 75,000 killed by the blast
and radiation. The destruction, coupled with a declaration of war by the
Soviet Union on the same day, led the Japanese to surrender on August
15th, officially ending WWII.

Closure Assignment #3

1.
2.
3.
Answer the following questions based on what you
have learned from Chapter 24, Section 3:
Summarize the arguments for and against an
Allied invasion of France before 1944. (At least 2
sentences)
How were the final phases of the war in Europe
similar to the final phases of the war in the
Pacific? How were they different? (At least 2
sentences)
What effect do you think possession of the atomic
bomb will have on the role of the United States in
the postwar world? (At least 1 sentence)
Holocaust

“Sacrifice by fire”; Term chosen by survivors following WWII
to describe the Nazi attempt to kill all Jews under their control.
Anti-Semitism

Prejudice towards those that are Jewish by birth or by choice; Adolf Hitler
blamed Jews for all of the ills in Germany, especially for Germany’s defeat
in WWI, and throughout the 1930s the Nazi party became increasingly
aggressive in their enforcement of anti-semitic policies.
Nuremberg Laws

Set of regulations for the treatment of Jews within Germany
presented by Hitler in 1935; Jews were denied German
citizenship, forbidden to marry non-Jews, & segregated at
every level of society, from schools & politics to business.
Kristallnacht

(November 9, 1938) “Night of the Broken Glass”; After a Jewish
refugee was accused of killing a German diplomat in Paris, Nazi
officials ordered attacks on Jews in Germany, Austria, and the
Sudetenland. 1,500 synagogues & 7,500 Jewish owned businesses
were destroyed, more than 200 Jews were killed, and thousands of
Jews were arrested.
Genocide

The willful annihilation of a racial, political, or cultural group.
Concentration Camps

Prisons where members of specially designated groups were
confined. The year he became chancellor (1933), Hitler opened
the first Nazi concentration camp to imprison political
opponents and turn them into “useful members of society.”
Death Camps

Nazi concentration camps in which prisoners were systematically
exterminated. Auschwitz in southern Poland was the largest of these
camps. At least 11 million Europeans, including 6 million Jews, were
murdered by the Nazis by 1945.
Closure Question #3: Do you think that the U.S. military
should have decided to bomb railway lines leading to the
death camps? Why or Why not? (At least 1 sentence)

Of the Allies, the Soviet Union was closest to the death
camps, but Stalin showed no concern. Britain and the United
States expressed sympathy, but their resources and strategy
were focused on defeating Hitler not on stopping his
genocidal campaign. They might have bombed railway lines
to the death camps, but the camps were not military targets.
A War Department official told the Refugee Board that
bombing the railway lines “could be executed only by the
diversion of considerable air support essential to the success
of our forces now engaged in decisive operations
elsewhere.” The Allies also refused to pressure countries
within the Nazi sphere of influence to stop the transportation
of Jews to Germany.
War Refugee Board

American institution established by FDR in early 1944
which worked with the Red Cross to save thousands of
Eastern European Jews.
Israel

Jewish nation established in Palestine in 1948 with the support
of all 3 Allied Powers; Arab Muslims, who had controlled the
region for nearly 1800 years, were forced out of the area,
sparking conflict in the region and Muslim resentment towards
the United States.
The Holocaust





9/11/01
April 11th, 1945 – American soldiers liberate Buchenwald Concentration Camp, the
first direct exposure to the Holocaust by American citizens.
May 7th, 1945 – Germany officially surrenders, ending the war in Europe.
Approximately 3 million Jewish refugees were freed from Concentration Camps.
November 29th, 1947 – The United Nations, due to pressure from U.S. President
Harry Truman, recognizes the formation of the Jewish state of Israel, forcing
250,000 Muslim Arabs out of their homes in the third-holiest city of the Islamic Faith,
Jerusalem. To this day, most Arab nations refuse to recognize the sovereignty of the
Jewish state of Israel.
1967; 1969-1970; 1973; 1977; 1981; 1982; 1987; 1991; 2006; 2009 – Years in which
the nation of Israel has been engaged in official warfare with Muslim nations,
including Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Iraq, Palestine, & Lebanon. In each of these
conflicts the United States has supported Israel.
September 11th, 2001 – Saudi Arabian Muslims, funded by the terrorist group Al
Qaeda, carry out kamikaze attacks on the Twin Towers in New York and the
Pentagon in Washington. Al Qaeda justifies the attacks due to the continued support
of the “illegal” Jewish state of Israel by the United States.
Closure Assignment #4

1.
2.
3.
Answer the following questions based on what you
have learned from Chapter 25, Section 4:
How were Hitler’s racial ideas and policies
connected to his concept of extreme nationalism?
(At least 1 sentence)
One historian has said that the Holocaust began
on “the day that the Jews started to be treated
differently.” Explain what this statement means
and what evidence supports it. (At least 2
sentences)
Do you think that the U.S. military should have
decided to bomb railway lines leading to the death
camps? Why or Why not? (At least 1 sentence)
Yalta Conference

February 1945 meeting of the leaders of the three Allied powers: Joseph
Stalin (U.S.S.R.), Winston Churchill (U.K.), and Franklin D. Roosevelt
(U.S.A.). The three agreed that after WWII Eastern European countries,
such as Poland and Bulgaria, would hold free elections. Stalin never
kept this promise, instead keeping Soviet troops in these countries and
establishing communist governments controlled by the U.S.S.R.
Potsdam Conference

(July 1945) First meeting between the new U.S. President, Harry
Truman, and Joseph Stalin. The Allies agreed to divide Germany
into 4 zones of occupation, establish new borders for Poland &
support free elections there, and permit the Soviets to claim
reparations for war damages from their zone of occupation in
Germany.
Superpowers

Title given to the United States and the Soviet Union following
WWII. The two were the most powerful militarily, had the largest
economies, & had opposing political systems, communism and
democracy, leading to competition between them for world
supremacy.
General Agreement of Tariffs and Trade

1948 multi-nation treaty designed to expand world trade by
reducing tariffs supported by the United States to encourage
post-WWII economic recovery.
United Nations

International organization established in April 1945 which,
many hoped, would succeed where the League of Nations had
failed in preventing warfare and resolving conflict between
nations. The five major WWII allies – the U.S.A., U.S.S.R.,
Britain, France, and China – make up the most powerful arm of
the U.N., the Security Council.
Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Issued in 1948 by the UN; The document, approved by all UN
member nations, condemns slavery and torture, upholds
freedom of speech and religion, and states that everyone has
the right to a healthy standard of living.
Closure Question #3: In what way were both the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights and the postwar push for civil
rights reactions to the war? (At least 1 sentence)



African American soldiers in World War II had clearly
believed they were fighting two foes: dictatorship overseas
and racism in the United States. As the great African
American poet Langston Hughes put it:
“You tell me that Hitler is a mighty bad man. I guess he took
lessons from the Ku Klux Klan.” – Langston Hughes, The
Fight of the Century
World War II gave renewed vigor to the fight for civil rights. In
this battle, African Americans were not alone. A growing
number of white Americans also called for the nation to fully
live up to its promise as a beacon of freedom, democracy,
and justice.
Geneva Convention

An international agreement made before WWII which governed
the humane treatment of wounded soldiers and prisoners of war.
Nuremberg Trials

Trials of Nazis for war crimes in violation of the Geneva Convention.
The trials, which were followed closely by Americans, highlighted
the horrors of the Holocaust. Though most of the defendants
pleaded that they were only following orders and that Hitler was to
blame for all crimes, virtually all accused were convicted and
sentenced to either death by hanging or long prison sentences.
Closure Assignment #5

1.
2.
3.
Answer the following questions based on what you
have learned from Chapter 24, Section 5:
Identify one possible consequence of the Allied
disagreements at Yalta and Potsdam. (At least 1
sentence)
Why do you think Americans supported
participation in the UN after WWII when they had
opposed participation in the League of Nations
after World War I? (At least 1 sentence)
In what way were both the Universal Declaration
of Human Rights and the postwar push for civil
rights reactions to the war? (At least 1 sentence)
Class Discussion: The Atomic Bomb

Instructions: Sit on the outside ring of the
circle with your group. You should have on
your desk a) notes to help you answer
your chosen question for the project and
b) your warm-up and closure sheets.
4-12-10 – Warm-Up
1. What is the greatest impact that
the atomic bomb attacks on Japan
have had on the world? (At least 1
reason, 1 sentence)
2. In your opinion, why were the
bombs dropped? (At least 1
reason, 1 sentence)
3. Was the decision to drop the
bombs “good”? Why or Why not?
Class Discussion: The Atomic Bomb

Instructions (Continued): While you are sitting
along the outside ring you should a) complete
the Bell Work assignment for today and b)
write down questions or comments to make
during the full class discussion.
Class Discussion: The Atomic Bomb
Inner Circle Order
1. How was this category of people involved
with the Atomic Bomb?
2. What impact did the attacks on Japan
have on this category?
3. From this group’s point of view, why were
the bombs dropped?
4. Was the decision to drop the bombs
“good”? Why or Why not?
