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America Enters the War FDR Supports England • After WWII beganFDR proclaimed the U.S. as neutral • But willing to help England and France as much as possible • FDR found loopholes in the Neutrality Act to give England 50 old destroyers to Britain The Isolationist Debate • By July 1940- most Americans favored offering some limited aid to the allies • Fight for Freedom Committeewanted to take a stronger action against Germany • America First Committee- opposed to any American involvement • Committee to Defend America by Aiding the Allies- increase aid to allies but opposed armed intervention Election of 1940 • 1940 Election- FDR vs. Wendell Willkie • Carefully campaigns for a course between neutrality and intervention • FDR is elected to an unprecedented 3rd term 1940 Election Results Edging Toward War • Lend-Lease Act- allowed the United States to lend or lease arms to any country considered “vital to the defense of the United States” • Could send weapons to Britain if they promised to return or pay for them • U.S. had “lent” $40 billion in weapons, vehicles, and supplies to the Allies Hemispheric Defense Zone • Getting the weapons to Britain was the hard part…u-boats • FDR declared the entire western half of the Atlantic to be in the western hemisphere…so neutral • The Navy would patrol the western half of the Atlantic and tell British ships where German u-boats were The Atlantic Charter • Agreement between FDR and Churchill • Committed both nations to postwar world of democracy, free trade, freedom of the seas, etc. Japan • Britain was worried that Japan would attack it’s colonies in the Pacific (India) • Japan depend on the U.S. for many supplies, including oil • To hinder Japanese aggression, FDR stopped sale of airplane fuel and scrap iron to Japan • An angry Japan- joined the Axis Powers FDR vs. Japan • 1941 FDR sends aid to China to help them fight Japan to stop expanding • FDR froze all Japanese assets in the U.S., reduced the amount of oil sent to Japan, started building bases in the Philippines Pearl Harbor • Japan and U.S. representatives were having “peace talks” • U.S. decodes a Japanese message that made it clear they were preparing for war against the U.S. • U.S. government thought that Japan was going to attack, but did not know where “A date that will live in Infamy” • Hawaii was thought to be too far away from Japan to launch a long range attack • Dec. 7, 1941 Japan attacks Pearl Harbor • Sank or damaged 8 battleships, 3 cruisers, 4 destroyers, and 6 other vessels • 2,403 Americans killed • 1,178 Americans injured Damages to Navy • Dec. 8- FDR met with Congress and asked them to declare war • Senate voted 82-0 and the House voted 388-1 to declare war on Japan • Dec. 11- Germany and Italy declare war on the United States