Download The Road to US Involvement in World War II

The Road to U.S.
Involvement in World War II
1918 – 1941
Legacy of the 1st World War
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Treaty of Versailles
• Germany severely punished and most of
Wilson’s 14 points left out
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League of Nations
• U.S., U.S.S.R., & Germany never join
• Helped settle disputes with small powers
• Less success with major powers

Could not stop Japanese, Italian, or German
aggression in the 1930s
U.S. returns to Isolationism

Washington Disarmament Conference (1921 –
1922)
• Five Power Treaty meant to reduce the navy power of
the U.S., Japan, & Britain
• U.S. basically lets Japan get a naval advantage in the
Pacific

Locarno Pact (1926)
• Western European nations agree to existing boarders
• “spirit of Locarno” would mean no more war
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Kellogg-Briand Pact (1928) – a.k.a. “Paris Pact”
• 62 nations: war illegal except for defensive purposes
• No enforcement mechanism
War Debt, Reparations, & the
Great Depression

U.S. a creditor nation after WWI (Allies owe $16
billion)
• High U.S. tariffs hurt European economies

Dawes Plan (1924)
• U.S. banks loaned Germany $, Germany paid Gr. Britain
& France, who paid the U.S.
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Hoover debt moratorium (1931)
• U.S. policies seen as harboring ill-will during the 1930s

World wide Great Depression
• Germany has 50%+ unemployment and huge inflation
• Japan exports fall by 50%, blame western trade policies
• What effect did this have in these countries in the
1930s?
U.S. changes policy in Latin
America
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Clark Memorandum (1928) –
reverses the “Big Stick” policy
FDR’s “Good Neighbor” policy
• By 1934, U.S. had removed all troops
from Nicaragua, Haiti, Cuba (repealed
Platt Amendment)
• Stayed out of Mexican oil nationalization
(which hurt U.S. oil companies)
U.S. and the World
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U.S. avoided London Economic Conference
(1933) – Isolationism
FDR (Sec. of State Cordell Hull) begins to
lower tariffs and to open free trade
agreements with 21 nations
FDR recognized the U.S.S.R. (1933)
Tydings-McDuffie Act (1934) – free the
Philippines after 10-year period of
economic and political tutelage
Totalitarian
States

Fascism
• Italy – Mussolini (1922)
• Germany – Hitler (1933)

Militarism
• Japan – Military
Dictatorship (early 1930s)

Communism
• U.S.S.R. – ruthless
leadership under Stalin
(1924)
Fascism and Nazism

Totalitarian
• Fascism – glorify the state and expand

Benito “Il Duce” Mussolini Controls Italy
• The Blackshirts (fascists) – restore glory of the
Roman Empire
• Becomes Dictator (1922)
• 1935 – Invades Ethiopia

Adolf Hitler Rules Germany
• Hitler joins National Socialist German Worker’s
Party (Nazis Party)
• Attempted to take over Germany in 1923
• Mein Kampf (“My Struggle”)
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Blamed Jews for Germany’s problems
Encouraged increase in military
Aryan race
• Der Fuhrer (“the leader”)
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Nazi party gains strength during the Great Depression
Hitler become dictator (1933)
Germany Expands
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1933 – Germany withdrawals from the
League of Nations
Invades the Rhineland (1936)
• Testing if anyone would stop them
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The German Empire Grows
• March 1938, Austria annexed
• Sudetenland (Czechoslovakian border)
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Munich Conference
France and Britain’s appeasement
• Czechoslovakia

Peace agreement with Soviet Union
• Poland
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September 1, 1939 – Hitler invades Poland
Britain and France declare war on Germany
September 5, 1939 – FDR declares U.S.
Neutral
Japan Expands
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1931 – Japan invades Manchuria (China)
1934 – ends Washington Naval Treaty
(1922) & begins a massive naval buildup
1936 – Anti-Comintern Pact with Nazi
Germany (anti-communism/U.S.S.R.)
Why?
• Needed raw materials, needed new markets,
needed space for population (U.S. anti-Asian
immigrant policy), wanted more respect from
the world’s powers
U.S. remains Isolated
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American people concerned with own economic
conditions and not rising totalitarianism
Nye Committee
• Concluded that U.S. involvement in WWI was to help banks
and munitions makers

Neutrality Acts (1935, 1936, & 1937)
• U.S. would not trade weapons or grant loans to belligerent
nations at war
• No travel on vessels of nations at war (no Lusitania this time)
• Cash and Carry Policy for non-military goods
• U.S. navy loses relative strength (idea that strong navies
cause war)
Europe Goes to War
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Blitzkrieg (“lighting war”)
• Stalin takes half of Poland for the
Soviet Union
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Sitzkrieg (“sit-down war”)
• French build up the Maginot Line
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April 9, 1940 – Hitler attacks
Denmark and Norway
May – Germany attacks Netherlands,
Belgium, and Luxembourg
Fall of France (June, 1940)
The Battle of Britain
• 1st of Hitler’s fatal mistakes

(June, 1941) Hitler invades the Soviet
Union (German need for Lebensraum)
• 2nd of Hitler’s fatal mistakes
Japan Continues to Expand

1937 – Japan launches full
scale war on southern China
• Ends Open Door
• Panay Incident (12/12/1937)
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Japan bombs a U.S. gunboat &
3 Standard Oil tankers on the
Yangtze River (2 killed, 30
wounded)
Japan apologizes and promised
no further attacks
1940 – Tripartite Pact:
Rome – Berlin – Tokyo Axis
U.S. response to Expansion
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1937 – FDR’s “Quarantine” speech
• Must “quarantine” expansions through economic
sanctions

12/29/1939 – FDR’s “Arsenal of Democracy”
speech
• Conflict in Europe is a threat to U.S. independence
(Nazis want to take over the world)
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Congress approves $37 billion for 2-ocean navy
and huge air force
Sept. 1940 – Selective Service and Training Act
• 21 to 35 registered for a year of military training
• 1st ever peace-time draft
Isolationists vs. Internationalism

America First
Committee

• U.S. protect its own
shores if Germany
defeats England

Charles Lindbergh
• Most famous of
isolationists

“Fortress America”
• Senator Robert A. Taft:
defense not
intervention
Committee to Defend
America by Aiding the
Allies
• Use “all methods short
of war” to defeat Hitler
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Destroyer-Bases Deal
• 9/2/1940: FDR trades
50 destroyers to Britain
for 8 bases in the
Western Hemisphere
Election of 1940
Democrats
FDR for a 3rd Term
1. Keep U.S. out of
war
2.
Defend New Deal
3. Aid to Allies
449 Electoral Votes
Republican
Wendell L. Willkie
1. Keep U.S. out of
war
2.
New Deal spends
too much
3.
Strengthen U.S.
defenses
82 Electoral Votes
FDR moves the U.S. to intervene
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1/6/1941 – “Four Freedoms” Speech
• Speech & Expression, Religion, from Want, & from Fear
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4/1941 – American Neutrality Patrol
• Patrol Atlantic for German U-boats
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8/1941 – Atlantic Charter
• Secret meeting between FDR & Churchill
• Basis of alliance (later endorsed by Stalin)
• Basis of the United Nations
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9/4/1941 – Shoot-on-sight Policy
• End of neutrality, American ships lost and U.S. begins to
occupy lands for their protection (Greenland & Iceland)
Japan Attacks Pearl Harbor
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U.S. warns Japan about
further movements in Asia
Embargo 1940, 1941
Japanese-U.S. negotiations
• Hideki Tojo
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December 7, 1941 – “a
date which will live in
infamy”
• U.S. declares war on Japan
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U.S. enters World War II
• Germany and Italy declare
war on the U.S.