Download Fighting World War II

Fighting World War II
1941 – 1945
America Declares War
 12/8/1941 – Declaration of war
on Japan
 12/11/1941 – Germany & Italy
declare war on the U.S.
 U.S. and Great Britain decide to
focus on Germany first
 Declaration of the United
Nations (Grand Alliance)
– 1/1/1942 – 26 countries met in
Washington, D.C.
– Pledged themselves to the
principles of the Atlantic
Charter
– Promised no separate peace
with common enemies
Japan’s
Empire
 U.S. lost islands of Guam, Wake Island,
and Gilbert Island by the end of
December, 1941 and the Philippines by
March, 1942
– General MacArthur – “I shall return”
 Japan controlled: Singapore, Dutch East
Indies, Malay peninsula, Hong Kong, &
Burma by spring 1942
 Resources
– 95% of world’s raw rubber, 70% of tin,
70% of rice
– Dutch East Indies supplied fuel
 “Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere”
– “Asia for Asians”
 Recognition of independence for Burma,
Vietnam, & Indonesia
 Nationalists fight back (Chiang kai-shek
in China)
Allied Defeats by mid 1942
 Japan controls Guam, Wake Island, Hong Kong,
Singapore, Burma, Dutch East Indies, & the Philippines
– Bataan Death March – 85 mile forced march of U.S. soldiers who
were tortured & eventually burned alive
 Doolittle Raid (April, 1942) – insignificant attack on
Tokyo in response to Pearl Harbor
 German advances reach their peak
– U-boats sink 8 million tons of allied supplies
– Control Russia as far east as Stalingrad
– Control North Africa as far east and south as El Alamein, Egypt
Allied Turning
Points (U.S.S.R.)
 Battle of Stalingrad
(September, 1942)
 First major defeat of the
Nazis on land
 Germany on the retreat
until Russians reach Berlin
in 1945
 Stalin never forgives the
Allies for not opening a 2nd
front earlier (U.S. & Britain
go to North Africa instead)
Allied Turning Points (N. Africa)
 Operation “Torch” led by General
Eisenhower (11/8/1943)
 British had been fighting General
Irwin Rommel (“Desert Fox”)
since 1941
 Allies led by U.S. invade in
Algeria & Morocco (Casablanca)
 Allied victory @ El Alamein
 Rommel pushed back to Tunisia,
huge German casualties
 Germans retreat back to Europe
Invasion of Italy
 Led by General George C. Patton
 7/10/1943 – Allies land in Sicily, victory in
a month
 Mussolini forced out of power by the
Italians
 6/4/1944 – Allies march into Rome
 Northern Italy remains under German
control until spring of 1945
D-Day (June 6, 1944)
 “Operation Overlord” commanded by
Eisenhower
 120,000 troops land on 5 beachheads on the
Normandy Coast of France
– 800,000 men in 3 weeks, 3 million total
– 2,245 Allied deaths, 1,670 wounded
 Significance:
– Established a 2nd Front in Europe (U.S.S.R. happy)
– Paris freed by August 25, 1944
– France, Belgium, & Luxemburg freed by end of
summer
D-Day
Invasion of Germany
 Pre-invasion carpet bombing of major cities,
factories, & oil refineries in Germany
 Allied invasion in September 1944 stopped by
Germany at the Rhine River
 Battle of the Bulge (Dec/Jan – 1944/1945)
– Ardennes forest in Belgium/Luxembourg
– Germany’s last major offensive, stopped by the 101st
Airborne Division & General Patton’s 110th Armored
Division
Battle of the Bulge
Invasion of Germany (cont.)
 Dresden fire bombed by Allies (over 100,000 killed)
 April 1945
–
–
–
–
–
U.S. approaches Berlin from the west, U.S.S.R. from the east
Germany’s Italian resistance collapsing
Mussolini caught by Italian resistance (killed)
Roosevelt dies
Hitler commits suicide
 V-E Day
– May 7, 1945
– Germany’s unconditional surrender
Japan Pushed Back
 Battle of Coral Sea (May 1942)
– 1st all aircraft carrier battle
– Prevents Japanese invasion of Australia
 Battle of Midway (June 4 – 7, 1942)
– Turning Point in the Pacific!
– Allies break Japanese Code
– Japan loses 4 aircraft carriers and 7
ships
– Prevents any chance of an invasion of
the U.S.
 Island Hopping campaign
– Goal = neatralize Japanese island
strongholds and then move on closer to
Japan
– Battle of Guadalcanal (Solomon
Islands) (Aug. 1942 – Feb. 1943)
• 1st Japanese land defeat
Japan Pushed Back (cont.)
 Iwo Jima (February 1945)
– Incredibly bloody fighting, Japanese will fight to the
last man
– Needed for planes to be close enough to attack Japan
 Okinawa (April – June, 1945)
– 50,000 American casualties
– American leaders know it will take far more to invade
Japan
 Begin bombing of Japan (starting March 1945)
– Tokyo loses 60% of its buildings and hundreds of
thousands of Japanese killed
Election 1944
 Roosevelt defeats
Republican Thomas Dewey
to win his 4th term in office
– Harry Truman FDR’s
running mate
 April 12, 1945
– FDR dies in Warm Springs,
GA
 Truman becomes president
The Atomic Bomb
 Manhattan Project begins in 1942
– Albert Einstein & Enrico Fermi warn
FDR in a letter in 1939 that the Germans
were working on a fission bomb
– Conducted at various location throughout
the U.S.
– Headed by Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer
leads out of Los Alamos, New Mexico
 Successful test (“Trinity”) on July
16, 1945 near Alamogordo, New
Mexico
 Potsdam Conference (July – August,
1945)
– Truman (w/ Stalin there) warns
Japan to surrender or suffer
“complete utter destruction”
Atomic Bomb (cont.)
 August 6, 1945 – Hiroshima
– “Little Boy” dropped from the Enola
Gay
– @ 80,000 killed instantly and hundreds
of thousands die later due to radiation
sickness and cancer
 August 8, 1945 – U.S.S.R. enters the
war against Japan
 August 9, 1945 – Nagasaki
– “Fat Man” kills @ 60,000 instantly
 August 14, 1945 – Japan surrender
(9/2/45 – official surrender on the
U.S.S. Missouri)
The Blasts
Hiroshima
Nagasaki
Hiroshima
Nagasaki
Japanese Surrender
Allied Diplomacy During WWII
 Casablanca Conference (1/14 – 25/43)
– FDR & Churchill
– Italy would be first target in Europe, not a 2nd front in
France
 Moscow Conference (10/43)
– Sec. of State Cordell Hull gets Soviet promise to join
in war against Japan after Germany defeated
 Declaration of Cairo (12/1/43)
– FDR meets with Chang Kai-shek
– Chinese lands would be returned to China and Korea
would be free
Allied Diplomacy During WWII
(cont.)
 Tehran Conference (11/28 – 12/1/43)
– 1st Meeting of the “Big Three” (FDR, Churchill, & Stalin)
– Allies agree to 2nd front in 1944
– Disagreement over carving up Germany and the types of government in
Eastern Europe after the war is over
 Yalta Conference (2/4 – 11/45)*
– “Big Three” discuss post-war Europe
– Stalin agrees to the “Declaration of Liberated Europe” (free elections in
eastern Europe)
– Set-up basics of the United Nations
– Germany to be divided up into occupation zones
– Poland to have a coalition government of communist & non-communist
 Potsdam Conference (7/17 – 8/2/45)
–
–
–
–
Truman, Stalin, & Clement
Alliance breaking down
Truman orders atomic bomb drop while at conference
Start of the “Cold War”
Tehran Conference
Yalta Conference
Potsdam Conference
WWII Aftermath
 Casualties
– @ 55 million dead, 35 million wounded, 3 million missing
• @ 30 million soldiers killed (@300,000 Americans)
• @ 25 million civilians killed (15 million in U.S.S.R.)
 Destruction
– 4 million British homes destroyed, 7 million buildings in
Germany, 1,700 towns in the U.S.S.R.
 Holocaust
– @6 million Jews killed as part of the “final solution”
– @6 million Gypsies, homosexuals, handicapped, Jehovah's
witnesses, & political opponents also killed
– U.S. response before & during the war
• “Americanism” of the 1920s continued into the 1940s
• German quota not met from 1933 to 1945, but Jews still turned
away
Normandy Cemetery
Post-war Political Issues
 Allies and Ideology
– WWII forced the “western” democracies and “eastern” communism to
work together
– Quickly turned to antagonism as the war ended
 Fate of Eastern Europe
– By the end of the war the Soviet Union controlled: Bulgaria, Romania,
& Hungary
– Nazis driven from Poland and Czechoslovakia
– Stalin promises free elections, west fears communism will win
 Germany’s Fate
– Soviets want a weak Germany
– U.S. & Britain want a strong economic Germany with a democracy
 Shift in the Balance of Power
– Western Europe no longer the leader of world affairs
– U.S. & U.S.S.R. become the two superpowers
The Post-War World
 Nationalism
– Colonies of Europe demand independence
• India gains freedom from Great Britain
• French Indochina (Vietnam) resists Europe
– Formation of Israel
 Social Changes
– African-Americans gain job opportunities (hope for more
changes)
– Many women find more opportunity, others return home
– Population shift to the “sunbelt”
 Technology
– Synthetic materials developed (due to rationing)
– Improved technology (planes, communication, computers, etc.)
– “Atomic Age”
 Cold War (1946 – 1992)