Ch 11. WWII
Turning the Tide
The War Continues…
• The RAF fought off the Nazis in the air war
over Britain
• US Navy was successful at the Battle of
the Coral Sea in stopping JAP plans for
domination in the Pacific
• Signs of hope existed for the Allies…
Axis Strategy…
• GER, IT, JAP all shared common enemies
but did not have a coordinated plan of
attack
• Hitler wanted to dominate Europe and
eliminate inferior peoples
• Mussolini had dreams of an IT empire
stretching from the Adriatic to East Africa
• Tojo wanted control over the Western
Pacific and Asia
Allies Strategy…
• Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin all considered
GER/Hitler the most dangerous enemy
• None believed that JAP or IT was a serious longterm threat
• GER had the resources to bomb BR, fight US and
BR navies on the Atlantic and invade RUS
• Although the plan was to win the two-front war – all
agreed on a “Europe First” strategy – so defeat
Hitler first and the Pacific would be the second
theater of war
Arsenal of Democracy…
• US factories turned
out millions of guns,
tanks, planes and
other supplies –
enough to keep the
BR and RUS
fighting for years
• But how to deliver?
Battle of the Atlantic
• How to keep GR subs from surrounding BR
and keeping them from US supplies
• US warships formed convoys with
merchant ships – the GR subs formed their
own convoys called “wolf packs” (30+ subs)
and sank nearly 3500 merchant ships
• When the US entered the war - the battle
spread - GR subs began attacking ships off
of the US coast
GR v. Russia
• As early as 1924 – Hitler wanted control of RUS
– claiming that GR needed lebensraum (living
space) to the east and wanting control of the
Caucasus oil fields
• After losing the Battle of BR – Hitler broke his
pact with Stalin and attacked RUS – Operation
Barbarossa
• Blitzkrieg---Wehrmacht – RUS was unprepared
for the lightening intensity of the GR attack
• GR ground troops executed the majority of RUS
they encountered
RUS v. GR
• Scorched Earth Policy – burning everything
while in retreat
• Stalin asked FDR for help through the LendLease program – Congress vetoed any aid for
RUS until June 1942
• GR troops threatened major cities in RUS –
Stalin asked that the Allies launch a major
offensive against GR in Europe so that Hitler
would have to divide his troops and fight on two
fronts
• The Allies hesitated and the RUS had to fight
GR on their own
Battle of Stalingrad
• RUS made a stand at Stalingrad – GR began a
2 month bombing and shelling campaign – RUS
hid in the rubble and began house to house
fighting
• Winter hits – RUS surround and attack the GR –
The Red Army launch their final assault on the
GR – 90,000 freezing, starving GR surrendered
on January, 31, 1943
• GR lost over 330,000 soldiers at Stalingrad
• This battle was the turning point of the war in the
east
North African Campaign
• BR had been fighting the GR & IT in North Africa
since 1940 – the BR won a decisive victory at El
Alamein and began forcing the GR Afrika Korp led
by the “Desert Fox” – Erwin Rommel - into retreat
to the west
• BR and US troops led by Gen Dwight Eisenhower
landed in Morocco and Algeria and began to push
east
• They trapped the GR at Tunisia – 240,000 GR & IT
supply-less soldiers surrendered against Hitler’s
command
• The Allies realized that they
needed strong commanders
and troops trained for desert
fighting to win to win in North
Africa
• Tank Commander George S.
Patton known as “Blood and
Guts” was put in command
• Patton pushed his troops east
as the BR pressed west from
Egypt – trapping the Axis
troops in Tunisia
Casablanca Conference
• Churchill and FDR meet again at
Casablanca, Morocco
• They made up a war plan – agreeing to
concentrate on the European Campaign
before trying to win the war in the Pacific –
increase the bombing of GER and invade IT
• They also agreed that neither would accept
anything less than the unconditional
surrender of GR, IT, & JAP
GI
• GI = Government Issue(stamp on clothing)
• 16 million American served in WWII
• 300,000 Mexican Americans fought to defend
the Philippines, served in N. Africa, and took part
in the D-Day invasion
• 25,000 Native Americans – 300 Navajos served
with the Marines as radio operators – “codetalkers”
• 20,000 Japanese Americans served – the 442nd
combat team became the most decorated
military unit in US military history
GI…..
• 1 million African Americans served
• 761st Tank Battalion captured 30 towns
from the GR in a 183 day marathon battle
• 99th Fighter Squadron “Black Eagles” shot
down over 110 planes over IT
• The JAP-AM and AA troops were not
immediately accepted into the rank and file
– it took heavy white casualties for these
minority groups to gain acceptance
Invasion of Italy
• US troops led by Gen Patton attacked Sicily and in 38
days Mussolini was overthrown
• As Allied troops threatened in the rest of IT – the new
government surrendered
• GR troops in IT continued to fight – they blocked roads,
destroyed bridges
• They surrounded the GR in Anzio – south of Rome and
fought a long agonizing battle to gain just a few miles of
beach
• When the fighting ended after one year and the allies
had won – over 72,000 GIs had been killed or wounded
at Anzio – over 190,000 GI casualties in the freeing of IT
• Rome was quickly captured and IT surrendered in April
of 1945
Air War
• RAF began bombing runs on GR in 1940
• The Luftwaffe forced the RAF to run night
missions only – after the Battle of BR – the
RAF began a technique called saturation
bombing – large # of bombs dropped on
GR cities –cities suffered heavy damage
• 1943 the US joined in the bombing raids –
concentrated on political and industrial
areas – strategic bombing – destroy GR
capacity to make war
Tuskegee Airmen…
• AA Fighter Squadron Began as escort and
protection planes rather
than carrying out bombing
raids
• 332nd Fighter Group
reportedly flew 1,500
successful support
missions – never losing a
single bomber
Home Front…
• War promoted and
prompted
patriotism and
production
• New economic
reality helped
women and
minorities
Women and the War
• Rosie the Riveter – popular song in 1942 – that
told the story of Rosie who worked in a defense
plant while her boyfriend Charlie served in the
Marines
• Her image was used in posters and recruitment
ads to get women to work
• The image was of a woman who was young,
white and middle class
• Patriotism was her motivation – she would do
her part while her boyfriend was off fighting
• Women of all ages and ethnicities wanted to
work for various reasons as well as doing their
part in the war effort
Recruiting Women
• Office of War Information launched recruitment
campaigns – aimed at women who might not
have normally sought out a job – older married
women
• 14.6 million women in 1941 to 19.4 million in
1944
• At one point women made up 35% of the total
civilian workforce
• Married women soon accounted for than ¾ of
the increase – by the end of the war ½ of all
women workers were over the age of 35
Benefits…
• Money earned paid off Depression debts
and helped to buy new homes
• Other women found their new jobs more
interesting and challenging
• Still others found that their new jobs made
them feel patriotic
• Women felt more self-confident and
important
Problems Women Faced…
• Experienced hostility from other workers in jobs
that were mostly male jobs
• Fraternizing rules were established
• Childcare was very limited – most mothers
arranged for other family members to care for
their children
• Women also earned less than men
• National War Labor Board said that women who
did the exact same job as men should earn the
same pay – this was widely ignored
• Women began at the bottom – Seniority rules
ensured that women advanced slower than men
African American Women
• Many AA women faced prejudice and
discrimination when they applied for these new
jobs
• Lawsuits and other forms of protest improved
their lots in life
• AA women employed in non-domestic jobs rose
from 6.8% to 18% from 1940-1944
• The number working as domestics dropped from
59.9% to 44.6%
Discrimination…
• During the war – FDR pushed for an end
to bigotry
• Even though many experienced a new
found freedom – the war made it more
difficult for some groups in the US
• African Americans and Japanese
Americans still had many difficulties
African Americans
• Jim Crow was alive and well in the South
• But many still faced hardship in the North
with discrimination in employment,
education and housing
• 1 out of 5 AA were jobless in 1941
• Gov’t agencies pushed for equality – they
still honored requests for “white only”
employees
Double V Campaign…
• The first V was for victory against the Axis
powers - The second V was for victory in
winning equality at home
• A. Philip Randolph – Labor leader – said
AA would not longer accept 2nd class
citizenship – gave FDR a list of demands
that AA needed in the workplace
• To counter a protest march during wartime
– Executive Order 8802 was issued by
FDR – fair hiring practices for any job that
was gov’t funded
Economic Discrimination
• 2 million AA migrated to the North looking for
jobs but finding other problems
• Segregation in housing and apartments was
common
• Housing was found only in ghettos
• 1941 – survey taken – 50% of all AA housing
was substandard versus only 14 % of white
housing
• White workers and homeowners did not want AA
in their workplaces or neighborhoods – riots
broke out in Detroit and NYC
CORE…
• CORE – Congress for Racial Equality –
believed in using non-violent means to end
racism – organized its first sit-in at the
Jack Spratt Coffee House in Chicago in
1943 – AA sat in every seat and refused to
leave until every one was served
• CORE groups quickly spread to other
major cities
Mexican Americans
• Both MA citizens and Mexicans working in the
US experienced discrimination before, during
and after the war
• But jobs were found by MA in the shipyards in in
Los Angeles – about 17,000 there – as well as in
aircraft factories in California, Texas, New
Mexico
• Many moved to major cities to work in other
defense jobs – Chicago, Detroit and NYC
Bracero Program
• 1942 – agreement between the US and Mexico
for workers (Braceros) in food production – the
US would provide transportation, food, shelter,
medical care
• 1942-1947 – 200,000 Braceros worked on
Farms and occasionally other industries to aid
the war effort
• Large Barrios (Spanish speaking
neighborhoods) grew up in Southern California
• Crowded conditions and discrimination caused
tension
Zoot Suit Riots
• MA young men wore a style of suit called a Zoot
Suit – long jackets, baggy pants with tight cuffs –
hair slicked back (ducktail)
• The look offended many people – US sailors on
leave in LA would go looking for fights with ZootSuiters because they looked “un-American”
• June 1943 – Full scale fighting began – most
blamed the MA men rather than the soldiers who
had started the fight – soldiers were banned
from leave in LA
Japanese Americans
• 1941 - .01% of the total US population –
127,000 JA lived in the US
• Most lived on the west coast where
prejudice had always been strong
• About 2/3 were Nisei or people who were
born in the US of parents who had
immigrated from Japan
• Although they were native born – they
were heavily discriminated against
Hostility and Hatred
• After Pearl Harbor, many Americans felt that the
JA were spies – newspaper headlines
strengthened their ideas
• Gov’t decided to remove all “aliens” from the
west coast
• Feb. 19, 1942 FDR signed Executive Order
9066 – authorized the Sec. of War to created
military zones and remove “any and all persons”
from such zones
• Germans, Italians and Japanese were all at first
affected – told to move away from the west
coast
• War Relocation Authority was set up to remove
all Japanese American citizens and non-citizens
– about 110,000 to Internment Camps
• Relocation happened so fast that most JA had
no time to secure their property
• Many lost businesses, homes, farms and other
property
• Camps were in desolate areas – wooden
barracks covered with tar paper – families were
given a room with cots, blankets and one light
bulb
• Toilet, bathing and dinning facilities were shared
• Barbed wire and armed guards surrounded the
camps
Legal Challenges
• Four lawsuits reached the Supreme Court
challenging relocation – However the Court
ruled that wartime relocation was constitutional
• Korematsu v. United States – Ted Korematsu
refused to go to a relocation camp – said that it
violated his civil rights
• The Majority Opinion said that it was a wartime
decision and it was upheld
• Early 1945 – JA were allowed to leave the
camps – many returned home to pick up their
lives – many found that nothing of their former
lives was left – 1988 US Gov’t gave each
internee $20,000 and an official apology
• “The worst thing about the camp was we
felt we didn’t have a country. We didn’t
know what we were, American or
Japanese. We could have been very
helpful in the defense work. Sitting in
camps like that didn’t do us any good.” –
1942 Internment camp resident
• Can a government ever justify locking up
some of its citizens even if they have
committed no crime? Explain your answer
completely in one clear paragraph.
Nisei Soldiers
• 17,000 JA served with the armed forces in
WWII – about 1,200 volunteered from relocation
centers - the rest came from Hawaii where there
were no relocation centers
• 442nd Regimental Combat Team – all Japanese
Americans – won more medals than any other
unit in WWII while fighting in Germany and
France
Great Arsenal of Democracy…
• US production increased each year of the
war
• By mid 1945 – 300,000 airplanes, 80,000
landing craft, 100,000 tanks and armored
cars, 5,600 merchant ships(2,600 Liberty
Ships), 6 million rifles, carbines and
machine guns, 41 billion rounds of ammo
•
•
•
•
1940 – 14.5% unemployed
1945 – 2 % unemployed
Union membership rose
Labor and management agreed after
Pearl Harbor to no more lock-outs or
strikes
• No Strikes became difficult as the cost of
living increased
• Gov’t often intervened in labor issues to
keep strikes from shutting down
production during war time
Cost of War
• Gov’t spending increased from $8.9 billion
in 1939 to $95.2 billion in 1945
• GNP doubled in that same time
• 1941-1945 – Cost to the Gov’t was $321
billion – 10 X the cost of WWI
• Higher income tax helped – 41% of the
cost of the war
• Revenue Act of 1942 – increase the # of
people who paid taxes, set up withholding
taxes or “pay-as-you-go”
• 94% was paid by the richest Americans –
higher rates were charged to corporations
and placed on consumer goods
• The rest of the money was borrowed from
banks, private investors and the public
• War Bonds – Defense Stamps were sold
to Adults and children across the US
The Government steps in…
• To organize the war effort at home…
• Office of Price Administration – 1941 – keep
shortages from sending prices up – avoiding
inflation – later it would oversee rationing
• War Production Board – 1942 – conversion of
industry from consumer goods to war goods
• No more cars/mowers/vacuums – Military gave
out contracts – the WPB set priorities and
allocated materials
• Rationing was another form of economic
control
• Each citizen was issued coupon books that
limited the amount of certain goods such
as passenger automobiles, typewriters,
sugar, gasoline, bicycles, footwear, fuel oil,
coffee, stoves, shoes, meat, lard,
shortening and oils, cheese, butter,
margarine, processed foods (canned,
bottled and frozen), dried fruits, canned
milk, firewood and coal, jams, jellies and
fruit butter and tires
Ration Books
• Point values assigned to sugar, coffee,
meat, butter, shoes, canned fruit
• Coupons were worth a certain number of
points for categories of food or clothing
• Once your points were used up – you
could not get more until you got your new
book or you traded coupons with your
neighbors
Public Support of the War
• Office of War Information – 1942 – worked
with magazines, ad agencies, and radio
stations to create patriotic ads and posters
to keep American morale high
• Victory Garden – Plant your own veggies
so that more can be sent to the troops
• By 1943 – Victory Gardens were
producing 1/3 of the country's vegetables
• “Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do
without”
Tehran Conference…
• Iran – Nov. 1943 – FDR, Churchill, and Stalin
met to set a cross channel invasion
• FDR sided with Stalin and felt that a new
front to the war needed to be added Churchill was not comfortable with the idea
but finally agreed
• With the RUS fighting GER already – the US
and BR Allied forces would open a new front
FR
• The invasion was called Operation Overlord
Prep for the Invasion
• US, BR, CAN, POL, DUT, BEL, FR troops
gather in southern BR to prep for the
invasion – 4,600 ships and landing crafts
• Plan called for striking 5 beaches in
Normandy – code names – Utah, Omaha,
Juno, Gold & Sword – fictional army set up
at Dover – fake ships/tanks, radio
• GR had reinforced their armaments from
their first days in FR - along the FR coast
– added machine-gun emplacements,
barbed wire fences, and land/water mines
D-Day
• June 6, 1944 – 11,000 planes pounded the
GR at Normandy
• 23,000 airborne US & BR soldiers dropped
behind enemy lines at night
• Sunrise on D-Day Allied warships in the
channel began shelling the coast
• 150,000 Allied troops started to come ashore
onto the beaches of Normandy at 6:30 am
facing artillery, water/land mines, heavy surf
D-Day….
• Hitler hesitated in his counter attack – he
believed a larger attack would happen
near Calais
• Regardless fighting was fierce – at Omaha
Beach – 2,000 Allied soldiers were killed
• One week – ½ million Allied soldiers were
in FR – 7 weeks later it was up to 2 million
Liberating Paris…
• Aug. 1944 – Paris is
liberated by the Allies
• Hitler had ordered that
Paris be destroyed but
his Generals
disobeyed him and left
the “City of Lights”
pristine
Allies Advance…
• Rommel and other GR commanders were
in despair – wanted to overthrow Hitler
• July 20, 1944 – bomb planted in
Hitler’s HQ – explosion killed/wounded 20
people but Hitler survived
• Rommel took poison to escape being put
on trial
• Hitler believed that fate was on his side
and refused to surrender
Battle of the Bulge
• BR & CAN forces freed Brussels and then
Belgium
• Sept. 1944 – Allied troops attacked the GR
in Holland – At the same time US troops
pushed into GR
• Defending the motherland – New GR
recruits as young as 15 – fought fiercely in
Belgium and Luxembourg – Dec. 1944 –
this became known as the Battle of the
Bulge
Battle of the Bulge cont’d….
• GR pushed the GIs back (bulge) causing
the troops to become separated – they
fought valiantly but were losing ground
• Eisenhower ordered reinforcements by
way of Gen. George Patton
• Patton moved his entire force of 250,000
soldiers across FR in a few days to help
stop the GR advance
Stats on the Battle of the Bulge
• Largest battle in WWII
• Largest battle ever fought by US troops
• 600,000 GIs – 80,000 were killed,
wounded or captured
• GR losses totaled about 100,000
• This was the absolute turning point for the
war in Europe – GR leadership realized
that they had lost
Russia v. Germany
• Fought from 1941-1945
• At any given time – it involved more than 9
million troops
• 13.6 million RUS & 3 million GRs killed =
2/3 of all killed in entire WWII
• Currently the count for RUS has actually
been pushed as high as 27 million
Allies Push to Victory…
• RUS had pushed to the Oder River
outside of Berlin – Allies had pushed
northward in IT
• Mussolini tried to escape the Allies troops
but was captured and executed
• AM & BR troops pushed to the Rhine
River in GER
• By April 1945 US troops pushed to the
Elbe River – 50 miles outside of Berlin
• Hitler was a wreck – had tremors, paranoid
from drugs, and kept alive with insane
dreams of final victory – gave orders that no
one followed – planned battles that no one
fought – kept cyanide pills with him always
• April 30, 1945 – He and his new wife Eva
Braun committed suicide by gunshot and
cyanide pills in their bunker – personal
servants tried to burn the bodies – shelling of
the bunker burned the bodies further – KGB
retrieved the bodies and cremated them in
1970 after many autopsies
V-E Day…
• May 7, 1945 GER surrendered in a small
FR schoolhouse that Eisenhower had
used as an HQ
• Americans celebrated V-E Day
• Sadly FDR had passed away on April 12,
1945 and was never able to see the end of
his hard work after 4 terms as President –
Harry S. Truman becomes the new US
President
Island Hopping
• Selectively attacking or bypassing specific
enemy held islands
• MacArthur and Adm. Halsley leapfrogged
through the Solomon Islands – as Nimitz did the
same starting in the Gilbert Islands
• Nimitz took Tarawa Island and used it as a base
to run bombing raids on the JAP in the Marshall
Islands – taking Kwajalein and Eniwetok isles
• From the Marshall Islands – Nimitz captured
parts of the Mariana Islands in June 1944
• US long range bombers could reach JAP from
this locale – began bombing JAP cities
Battle of Midway
• Yamamoto believed that JAP would win
the war if they could completely destroy
the US Fleet
• He directed a large part of the JAP Fleet to
Midway Island
• He knew that Adm. Chester Nimitz would
do anything to protect Midway – thus
protecting Hawaii
• June 4 1942 – battle began - air war
Battle of Midway…
• Due to US code breakers – Nimitz knew the general
facts about the JAP plan of attack
• US planes found the JAP carriers at a vulnerable
time – as they were loading bombs onto their planes
• US planes quickly destroyed 3 of the 4 JAP carriers
as bombs on deck to be loaded exploded during the
attack
• The 4th carrier was destroyed while trying to escape
• The loss of 4 carriers and 250 planes was a huge
blow to the JAP Naval Fleet – never again were they
able to launch an offensive attack
Battle of Guadalcanal
• Solomon Islands – off NE coast of AUS – 11,000
Marines landed in Aug. 1942
• 2,200 JAP fled into the jungle – 4 mos. of
fighting finally saw the JAP flee the island
• Gave the Marines their first taste of jungle
warfare – snipers made quick work of the
Marines – hiding in brush or the tops of palm
trees
• The Marines only knew they had won when they
say the empty JAP boats on the beach.
Battle of Leyte
• MacArthur promised to return – Oct. 1944
• 160,000 US troops invade the Philippines at
Leyte
• As troops pushed inland – a massive naval war
was taking place
• Over 280 warships engaged in the 3 day Battle
of Leyte – JAP high command directed every
ship still floating to push for a full out attack –
Kamikaze attacks used
• JAP were badly beaten and their navy was 90%
destroyed
• JAP land troops continued fighting – 80,000 JAP
killed in the battle for control of Leyte – fewer
than 1,000 JAP surrendered
Battle of Manila
• Philippines capital city – island of Luzon
• Hard fought victory – one month battle left
most of the city in ruins
• 100,000 Filipino civilians killed
• Philippines would not be completely freed
from the JAP until June 1945
Battle of Iwo Jima
• Tiny volcanic island 700 miles from JAP
• Caves and tunnels served the JAP well in trying
to defend their territory
• 600+ guns encased in concrete bunkers –
protected by natural barriers
• Nov. 1944 – US bombers pound Iwo Jima from
the air – for 74 days planes and warships
poured nearly 7,000 tons of bombs and 20,000
shells into the JAP defenses
• Mt. Suribachi
Iwo Jima…
• Feb. 1945 Marines take the beaches – fierce
fighting – in 3 days had advanced 700 yards
• 110,000 US troops v. 25,000 JAP
• One month to secure the island – Jap fought
until the bitter end – only 216 JAP prisoners
• 25,000 US casualties in taking a 14 sq. mile
island
• 27 Medals of Honor awarded from this battle
alone – more than any other battle in WWII
• “Uncommon valor was a common virtue” Nimitz
Battle of Okinawa
• April-June 1945 – 100,000 JAP defended this
last obstacle to JAP mainland invasion – 350
miles off the coast of Japan
• JAP soldiers pledged to fight to the death
• Kamikaze (2000) and Banzai (kill as many
enemy while dying in battle) attacks almost
hourly
• 2nd largest Allied force since Normandy –
180,000 US and BR troops gathered on the
beaches
• 7,200 JAP remained to surrender
• 50,000 US casualties made this the costliest
battle of the Pacific war
Manhattan Project
• Tipped off the GR were working on the project by
Albert Einstein (escaped from Nazi GR) – FDR
organized a group to pursue a bomb that would end
the war
• Splitting the nucleus of a uranium atom, Creating a
controlled chain reaction explosion – Enrico Fermi
(left Fascist IT) achieved the chain reaction at Univ.
of Chicago lab in 1942
• July 16, 1945 – field test first Atomic bomb in a
remote New Mexican desert
• J Robert Oppenheimer – project director said “Now
I am become Death – the destroyers of worlds”
Drop the bomb?
• Debate raged – to use it or not ?
• Continued bombing? Test the bomb to
scare the JAP? Negotiations? Full out
invasion? All sides were discussed.
• The Interim Committee (Scientists, Military
Ofcrs., Gov’t Officials) discussed all sides
• After the total casualties of Okinawa & Iwo
Jima – The committee decided to go
ahead with the Atomic Bomb
• Final decision rested with the President Harry S. Truman ( FDR died in office 4/45)
Drop the Bomb.
• Aug. 6, 1945 – Atomic Bomb “Little Boy”
dropped on Hiroshima
• No exact casualty info exists – estimated
140,000 died in the explosion or within a few
months from radiation burns and illness
• 90% of the city’s buildings were destroyed
• Aug. 9, 1945 – A-bomb “Fat Man” dropped on
Nagasaki – with the same outcome
• Aug. 15, 1945 – Japan surrendered – V-J Day
• Official agreement signed Sept 2, 1945 on
board the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay
The Holocaust
• Nazi GR systematic murder of European
Jews – 6 million – 2/3 of Europe’s Jewish
population massacred by the end of WWII
• 8% of Jews taken into camps - survived
• 5-6 million other people also die in Nazi
captivity
• Anti-Semitism – Hostility/violence against
Jews – became official policy of the Nazi’s
• Hitler blames Jews for all the ills of GER –
from Communism, to inflation, to abstract
painting and especially for losing WWI
Nazi Germany
• GR citizens were encourage to stop patronizing
Jewish business
• 1935 Nuremburg Laws – stripped GR Jews of
citizenship and forbade marriage between Jews
and non-Jews
• Jewish Doctors were banned from treating nonJews
• All GR people had to carry ID’s – Jews were
marked with a red “J”
• All Jews had to take new middle names – Sarah
or Israel – for easier identification by Police
• SS – elite guard for the Nazi party / Gestapo –
secret state police – dissidents were thrown into
“camps”
Kristallnacht
• Nov. 9-10, 1938 – Nazi thugs throughout
GR and Austria loot and destroy Jewish
businesses (7,000), homes and
synagogues (1,688).
• 100 Jews killed, 30,000 sent to camps
• Known as Kristallnacht “Night of the
Broken Glass” referring to the store
windows that were broken by the Nazi’s
Refugees Escape
• 130,000 Jews fled GR prior to 1937 – which was
encouraged by the Nazis – many countries are
not willing to deal with the refugees- the US
included
• At first Jews were rounded up and kept in
ghettos surrounded by barbed wire walls –
disease, starvation kill off many
• Einsatzgruppen = mobile killing units – Killed
whoever and wherever they were sent – upper
class, doctors, Jews, political leaders in POL,
RUS
Wannsee Conference
• Jan. 1942 – Nazis meet to come up with
the “final solution” about what to do with
the Jews
• Establish special concentration camps in
rural areas of GR
• At these camps a known campaign of
genocide would be carried out
• Genocide = deliberate destruction of an
entire ethnic group
Concentration Camps
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Poles ---- 2 million
Homosexuals --- 10,000
Jehovah's Witnesses--- 4,000
Mentally Ill and Physically Disabled—250,000
Gypsies/Romanies –--- 1.5 million
Communists ------3 million
Church Officials – 15,000
Jews ---- 6 million
60,000 REICH
MARKS –
THAT’S WHAT
IT COSTS TO
KEEP THIS
MAN ( with
genetic defects)
ALIVE – ITS
YOUR MONEY
TOO..
Joseph Goebbels
• Minister of Propaganda
• “Our starting point is not the individual --We do not subscribe to the view that one
should feed the hungry, give drink to the
thirsty or clothe the naked…Our objectives
are different: We must have healthy
people in order to prevail in this world.”
1938
• 15,0000 camps
of varying sizes
were set up
across the 15
Nazi occupied
countries – with
many in Poland
Death Camps
• Experiments were done to see what the
most efficient way to kill was
• Poisonous gas Zyklon-B was best when
administered in disguise as a shower –
killed in 20 minutes or less
• Tried it out in Poland – killed 2,300 Jews
the first day – eventually built 6 camps in
Poland
• Concentration Camps = work until you die
• Death Camps = mass murder
• Arrive at camp – inspected …..
• Elderly, women with small children and
those who were obviously sick/weak were
taken straight to the gas chambers and
killed
• Guards forced prisoners to carry the dead
to the crematorium to be burned in big
ovens
• Those who were not gassed – heads were
shaved, registration # tattooed on their
arms, given 1 set of clothes and then
herded into overcrowded, cold, dirty
barracks – no bathrooms, no beds
• Only food was a thin soup made with
rotten vegetables
• Diseases swept through and killed many
who were weakened by labor and hunger
• “Selections” were made periodically to get
rid of the weak or sick
• Treblinka = 870,000 killed
• Belzec = 600,000 killed
• Auschwitz = 1.5 million killed – 90% Jews
• Buchenwald = 43,000 killed at work camp
Resistance
• In and out of the camps Jews resisted the
Nazi’s
• In Poland 700 Jews armed with handguns
and homemade bombs held out for a
month against 2,000 GR soldiers
• Revolts erupted in camps – rioting
prisoners damaged one camp so badly it
had to be closed
• Escape was the most common form of
resistance
Dr. Josef Mengele
• Medical
experimentation
• Pressure chambers,
new drug testing,
freezing temperatures,
amputations, no
anesthetic, eye color
experiments, live
autopsies
• Children, twins, dwarfs
• “I remember one set of twins in particular:
Guido and Ina – age 4. Mengele took
them away. When they returned they
were sewn together, back to back – like
Siamese twins. Their wounds were so
infected – they screamed day and night.
Then their parents managed to get some
morphine and they killed their children in
order to end their suffering” – Vera
Alexander, Jewish Inmate at Auschwitz –
who looked after 50 sets of Romani twins
Rescue & Liberation
• US newspapers were not interested in the
Holocaust during the war
• American Jews were ineffective in getting
the Gov’t to rescue the prisoners
• With funding – Raoul Wallenburg was able
to rescue 1,000s of Hungarian Jews by
issuing them Swedish passports
• Oskar Schindler purposefully employed
1300 Jews in his factories so that they
would not be shipped to the gas chambers
Could It Have Been Stopped?
• Early on – most countries (US included)
could have done more by relaxing their
immigration policy
• Could have saved the lives of many Jews
from across Europe
• Many have placed blame on many areas –
anti-Semitism, apathy, Great Depression,
underestimation of Hitler’s plans
US Takes Action…
• US and BR attend Bermuda Conference to
discuss what should be done to help the
Jewish refugees and how the other Jews
could be rescued from the Camps
• FDR set up the War Refugee Board which
worked with the Red Cross to save
thousands of Eastern European Jews
• Most of the camps were close to RUS but Stalin was not concerned with the
Jews lives and did little to help them
• BR and US were sympathetic but had
other issues to deal with
• RR lines to the camps could have been
bombed but it was argues that to do so
would take valuable resources (planes)
from other targets that were important to
victory
• After GI’s retold the stories of what they
saw when they liberated the camps made
Americans sympathetic to the plight of
these people – Many Jews found refuge in
the US after WWII
Different from WWI…
• WWII was fought to the bitter end
• GER and JAP kept fighting even after they
knew victory was not possible
• Allied Bombing devastated both JAP and
GER cities and farm land
• GER fought until Hitler committed suicide
• JAP fought until the bombs were dropped
Yalta/Potsdam Conferences
• Feb. 1945 – 2 mos. before the fall of Berlin
• FDR, Churchill & Stalin met in Yalta, Russia to discuss
post war plans
• At Potsdam, GER later in 1945 – Plan for GER division
was implemented
• Germany would be split into 4 zones – US, RUS, BR &
FR would each control 1 zone
• Berlin would also be split into 4 zones. Berlin was in the
Soviet held zone
• Stalin promised elections in the nations that his armies
had liberated and also to enter the war against JAP as
soon as GR surrendered
• Stalin did not keep his election promise and FDR and
Churchill were accused of not doing enough to prevent
Soviet domination in eastern Europe
Changes Post WWII…
• Gen MacArthur stays in JAP and helps to
write a new constitution – abolished the
military except for defense, women’s
suffrage, set democratic reforms, and set
the foundation for a full economic recovery
• Abuses of imperialism prior to the war
were examined – many controlled people
wanted independence – East Indies,
Indochina, India, Burma
Balance of Power Shifts…
• BR/FR/GER were no longer the superpowers – RUS and US came out of WWII in
positions of strength
• With the exception of Pearl Harbor, US was
untouched by war – US was wealthy,
militarily powerful and confident
• RUS had much of the war fought on its soil RUS industries, cities, people suffered
• US had the A-Bomb – RUS had the Red
Army – world’s largest military force
US Uses Its New Power…
• US pushes for the International Monetary
Fund and the World Bank (US funded) –
foster global economic and financial
stability
• General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
(GATT) set up to expand world trade and
reduce tariffs
United Nations…
• April 1945 -United Nations created – 50 delegates
met in San Francisco to write the charter
• Set up on the idea of cooperation of the Great
Powers not on the absolute equality of all nations
• All member nations sat on the General Assembly
but the 5 WWII Allies were permanent members of
the Security Council
• Helped to create Israel, provide food and aid
• Universal Declaration of Human Rights –
condemns slavery & torture, freedom of speech &
religion, supports an adequate standard of living
War Criminals…
• Axis had repeatedly violated Geneva
Convention (sick/wounded, field/at sea,
civilians, pow’s)
• 1,000s of Jap were tried for atrocities
committed in CH, KOR, & SE Asia and
mistreating POWs – 100s were put to death
including Tojo for the Bataan Death March
• Nuremburg Trails – Nazi war crimes and the
Holocaust – no longer would “I was following
orders” be accepted – the outcome was “You
are responsible for your own actions”
New American Identity…
• US fought in WWII for tolerance, freedom,
democracy, & peace
• During the war – US leaders and popular
culture emphasized these positive themes
repeating that the Allies were fighting the
“people’s war”
• Although war does not always lend itself to
those ideals – it was hoped that the
postwar period would bring about changes
Isolationism Again?
• Most Americans had kept a close eye on
the war – the troops movements – battles
won or lost
• Americans knew that the US could not go
back to a period of isolationism – that the
US had a huge role to play in the world
peace and economic development