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Post-World War I
Problems leftover from WW I
– World-wide feelings of hatred
– Extreme Nationalism
– Fear of Communism by Western countries
– Depression
• Inflation and unemployment
Totalitarian Government
a form of government in which the political authority exercises absolute
and centralized control over all aspects of life, the individual is
subordinated to the state, and opposing political and cultural expression
is suppressed
ITALY
Benito Mussolini
Fascism
• Hated Communism –
– threat to private property
• Glorification of State (state over individual)
• Militarism is ultimate expression of power
• Rejection of liberalism and democracy
Dreamed of Italian empire like the
ancient Romans
Japan
Emperor Hirohito
Hideki Tōjō 東条 英機
the leader of the Taisei Yokusankai
Prime Minister of Japan during most of war
1941 to July 22, 1944
directly responsible for the attack on Pearl Harbor
Emperor – Military
• Above all political parties or laws
• Responsible to imperial ancestors
• Japan lacked raw materials
– Supported Territorial expansion / Japanese Imperialism
– Aggressive military campaign
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China (1937)
Manchuria
Korea
Soviet Union
Joseph Stalin
Soviet Communism – “Stalinism”
• Command Economy
– Built up Industry
– Built a large military
• World Leadership International Communism
• “Collectivization” of all farming
– Provided machinery
• Promotion of Atheism
– Outlawed popular Russian Orthodox Church
– All public display of any religion
Stalin’s Totalitarian State
Dictatorship- Absolute Authority
State Control Over All Sectors of Society
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Economy and Business (anti-capitalism)
Labor and Pay
Housing
Education
Youth groups (Propaganda)
Arts
Stalin’s Totalitarian State
State Control Over the Individual
Obedience
The Great Purge
Counter-Revolutionaries and “enemies of the People”
According to the declassified Soviet archives, during 1937 - 1938, the NKVD detained 1,548,366 victims, of whom 681,692
were shot - an average of 1,000 executions a day in 1937/38 alone…
Germany
Adolf Hitler
(1933)
National Socialist Workers Party
- NAZI
•Dictator
•Eliminated Parliamentary Democracy
•Police state to control population
•Aggressive elimination of all opposition
Germany
Adolf Hitler
1935 – Passed the Nuremberg Laws
Deprived Jews of German citizenship and prohibited racially mixed
marriages between Germans and Jews.
1935, the laws were extended to "Gypsies, Negroes or their bastard offspring"
1936 – Moved troops into the Rhineland (France)
France and Great Britain did nothing…
Germany
Adolf Hitler
(1933)
Appeasement
• a diplomatic policy aimed at making
concessions to an aggressor
Munich Pact
• Convinced Czechoslovakia to give Hitler the
Sudetenland
• Hitler promised to go no further
Soviet Union (Russia)
Joseph Stalin
(1927)
Non-Aggression Pact (1939)
Hitler said he would not attack the Soviet Union
Stalin knew it was only a matter of time ….
so he prepared for war
Nazi foreign minister Joachim von
Ribbentrop (left), Soviet leader Joseph
Stalin and Soviet foreign minister
Viacheslav Molotov at the signing of
the nonaggression pact between
Germany and the Soviet Union.
Great Britain
Winston Churchill
Did not believe it….
“Britain and France had to choose between war
and dishonor. They chose dishonor. They will
have war.”
Japanese Aggression
Prime Minister Hamaguchi Osachi
• Assassinated by ultra-national
Army invades Manchuria
• League of Nations condemns it but
powerless to do anything about it
Japanese Aggression
Rape of Nanking
The Nanking Massacre, also known as the Rape of Nanking, was an episode of mass murder
and mass rape committed by Japanese troops against Nanking (China)
1937
Historians and witnesses have estimated that 250,000 to 300,000 people were killed.
United States
Neutrality Act
prohibited the sale of weapons to warring countries
AXIS POWERS
Germany, Italy and Japan sign agreement