Section 1: Dictators Threaten World Peace
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Treaty of Versailles did not create a “just &
secure peace”.
Germans thought they were treated unfairly
* blamed for WWI
* stripped of some territories
* had to pay for war
Soviets also resented the fact they had lost
territories
Did not make the world “safe for democracy”
* new democracies collapsed due to above
Dictators seized power
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Focused on creating a model Communism state
Reconstructed agriculture & industry which
trampled the rights of his people
Government controlled the farms & production
Second goal: change Russia from a rural nation
to an industrial power
If you disagreed with Stalin you were shipped off
to Siberia to live in a labor camp
Great Purge of 1934-1938-Stalin executed
millions of people who disagreed with him
Establish a totalitarian government: complete
control over citizens
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Benito Mussolini was establishing a
totalitarian regime in Italy
Fascism: a political movement that had a
strong centralized government headed by a
powerful dictator (rooted in nationalism)
Many people supported Mussolini
Eventually extended fascist control over all
aspects of Italian life
Wanted Italy to be a world power
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Nazism: based on extreme nationalism
Hitler dreamed of united all German speaking
people in a great German empire
Master race: blue eyed, blond hair “Aryans” that
was destined to rule the world
Inferior race: Jews, Slavs & nonwhites were only
fit to serve the Aryans
Wanted to expand Germany by any means
Due to the Great Depression many unemployed
Germans turned to Hitler & appointed him
Chancellor(prime minister)
Established the “Third Reich” or Third German
Empire
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Militarists gain control in Japan
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Wanted to expand Japan
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Launched an invasion of Manchuria
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Militarists are firmly in control of Japan’s
government
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Japan quits the League
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Hitler pulls out of the League
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Mussolini is ready to invade Ethiopia: the
League Of Nations does nothing
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U.S. clings to Isolationism (we don’t want to
get involved)
Congresses passes the Neutrality Act
* to keep the U.S. out of future wars
* banned the selling of arms
* no loans to nations undergoing civil wars
Roosevelt starts to change his mind when
Japan invades China
* Roosevelt sends arms & supplies to China
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Germany wanted to expand by taking the
lands of the Czechs & Austria
Most Austrians were German who favored
unification with Germany
On March 12, 1938, German troops marched
into Austria unopposed & a day later said the
union with Austria was complete
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3 million German speaking people lived in Czech
region of Sudetenland
Mountains were a defense against German attack
Hitler charged that the Czechs were abusing the
Sudeten Germans
Hitler began moving in massive troops
Great Britain & France promised to protect the
Czechs
Hitler called in French premier Edouard Daladier
British prime minister Neveille Chamberlain to
meet with him
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Hitler told them the Sudetenland would be the
last territory he would go after
They believed him – wanted to avoid war
Munich Agreement: turned over Sudetenland over
to Germany on Sept. 30, 1938
Winston Churchill said Britain & France had to
choose between war & dishonor. They choose
dishonor.
Appeasement: giving up principles to pacify an
aggressor
On March 15, 1939, the Germans took over all of
Czech
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Poland had a sizable German-speaking
population.
Charged that the Germans in Poland were being
mistreated by the Poles
Russia, France & Great Britain backed Poland –
everyone thought Hitler was bluffing
Stalin surprises everyone and signs a nonaggression act with Hitler
On August 23, 1939, Fascist Germany &
communist Russia commit to never attack each
other (WWI they were fierce enemies)
Second secret pact: agreed to share Poland
Fate of Poland was sealed
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Invades Denmark, Norway, Netherlands,
Belgium & Luxembourg
Germany & Italy invade France. France
surrenders in 1940
Germany started bombing Britain day & night
for months
Britain fights off the German planes using
radar & Hitler calls off the invasion
Stalin invades Finland
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On April 7, 1933 Hitler ordered all non Aryans to
be removed from government jobs
Jews center of Nazi target: Germans looked to
the Jews as scapegoats for their failures
Hitler persuaded many Germans to believe that
the Jews were responsible for the Germany’s
economic problems & defeat in WWI
In 1935, Nuremberg Laws stripped Jews of their
German citizenship, jobs & property
Jews had to wear a bright yellow star of David so
they could be identified
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Means “Night of Broken Glass”
Jewish shop windows were broken by the
hundreds by the SS
City was littered with broken glass
100 Jews killed
30,000 Jews arrested & hundred of
synagogues were burned
Nazis blamed the Jews for the destruction
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Jews fleeing Germany had trouble finding a
place to go
France took 40,000 refugees and would take
no more
British would only admit 80,000 Jewish
refugees
Palestine (controlled by Britain) took only
30,000 refugees
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Final Solution – genocide: the deliberate and
systematic killing of an entire population
Hitler was obsessed with ridding Europe of all
Jews
Hitler’s belief: Aryans were superior & the
strength & purity of this race must be
preserved
Nazis condemned the Jews & inferior races to
slavery and death
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First step: silence & eliminate their political
opponents
Second: not only eliminate Jews but the following
groups as well:
* Gypsies
* Freemasons: supporters of Jewish
conspiracy to rule the world
* Jehovah’s Witnesses: refused to join the
army or salute Hitler
Also included mentally ill, disabled, incurably ill
Implemented Final Solution in Poland with Nazi
death squads
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Ghettos; segregated Jewish areas that were
run down & over-crowded
Sealed off with barbed wire & stone walls
Forced to work in German industries
Jews published secret underground
newspapers
Secret schools were set up to educate the
Jewish children
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Were originally set up to imprison political
opponents & protestors
Nazis expanded the camps & used it to
warehouse the “undesirable”
Jewish families dragged from their homes,
herded onto trains, with many families split apart
Life was a cycle of hunger, humiliation, & work
that almost always ended in death
Lived in wooden barracks – up to 1,000 people
Made to work until they collapsed – if too weak,
they were killed
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Mass murder by poisonous gas
Six death camps
Separated by strong vs. weak
Weak would be led into the gas chamber to
die
Buried bodies at first, then cremated due to
the smell & stench of decaying bodies
Medical experiments were carried out on Jews
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FDR is committed to staying out of the war,
but knows there will be no world peace with
dictators in control
FDR & Congress pass the “cash & carry”
provision that allows U.S. to sell arms to
warring nations
This would help Great Britain & France to
defeat Germany
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U.S. was sending everything it could to Britain
to help them win the war
Japan, Italy & Germany signed a mutual
defense treaty known as Tripartite Pact
The three nations became known as the Axis
Powers
The Tripartite Act was aimed at keeping the
U.S. out of the war
If U.S. declared war on one of them, it would
face all of them
A two ocean war if this happened
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FDR increased defense spending
Initiated a peacetime draft called-The Selective
Training & Service Act
16 million men, 21-35 were registered, 1 million
were drafted
FDR knew we had to aid Britain – if Britain fell to
Germany, then Germany would go unchallenged
to conquer the world
Lend-Lease plan; Britain had run out of money.
U.S. would lease weapon to them or “any country
whose defense was vital to the U.S”.
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Hitler breaks his agreement with Stalin
FDR acts on the principle, “the enemy of my
enemy is my friend” -he starts sending lendlease supplies to the Soviet Union
Hitler deploys U-boats to attack supply ships
carrying war supplies
Wolf Packs – sending groups of up to 40
submarines (U-boats) to patrol areas in the
Atlantic – sank 350,000 tons of shipments
FDR gives the U.S. Navy permission for U.S.
warships to attack German U-boats
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FDR & Churchill meet secretly on a joint
declaration of war aims called the Atlantic
Charter & both parties pledge
*security, disarmament, self-determination,
economic cooperation & freedom of the
seas
FDR: “he would wage war and do everything
to force an incident”
Basis for the Declaration of the United
Nations: expressed the common purpose of
the Allies
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Germany’s victories created opportunities for
Japan expansionists
Japan invades China
Japan seizes control of French, Dutch & Great
Britain’s colonial powers in east Asia
British to busy fighting Hitler to do anything
about it
U.S. and our Pacific islands remain in Japan’s
way
Japan proceeds and takes over Indochina
(Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos)
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U.S. cuts off trade to Japan – one of the goods is
oil, which Japan can’t live without
Japan prepares for an attack on the U.S.
U.S. learns of the attack – but doesn’t know
where the attack will be
Dec. 7, 1941, Japan attacks Pearl Harbor – the
largest U.S. naval base
180 Japanese warplanes were used in the attack
In less than two hours Japan had killed 2,400 &
wounded 1,100, sunk 21 ships, 300 aircrafts
damaged/destroyed
FDR declares war
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Selective Service Draft expanded & provided
another 10 million soldiers
Women’s Auxiliary Army Corps; served in
noncombat positions: nurses, radio
operators, electricians
Industrial Production of tanks, planes, boats
increased and expanded
Women working in factories exceeded 6
million: Rosie the Riveter
Economic Controls: rationing of meat, shoes,
sugar, gas & price freezes
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Battle of Stalingrad: Hitler goes to war with Stalin
& the Soviet Union
*Hitler wants the oil fields & wants to wipe
out Stalingrad, a major industrial center
* long hard fought battle with many
casualties: 1.1 million Soviet soldiers
* Winter set in & German soldiers froze and
starved to death
* Germany surrenders to Soviets on
January 31, 1943
* Marked a turning point in the war
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U.S. troops invade Italy & capture Sicily
Mussolini is stripped of power by Italian
Emperor
Germany comes to help Italy in one of the
hardest fought battles near Rome; lasts 4
months
U.S. troops win battle in May of 1944
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Called Operation Overload & commanded by
Dwight D. Eisenhower
3 million troops (U.S., British, Canadians)
invade Normandy in France
Set up a phantom army & headquarters to
keep mission a secret
Troops parachuted in onto the beach
With the help of George Patton & the Third
Army, France is freed from Germany
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October, 1944 America captures their first
German town
Germans made a last ditch effort to bust
through American lines.
Battle lasted for a month
Americans pushed Germans back & the Nazis
retreated
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Soviet troops liberate a camp called Majdanek
in Poland
Found a thousand starving prisoners, the
largest crematorium & a storehouse
containing 800,000 shoes
Soviets called it: “A giant murder plant”
Americans liberate death camps in Germany
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Hitler marries Eva Braun
Wrote his last address to the German people:
he blamed the Jews for starting the war & his
generals for losing it
Wife swallowed poison, Hitler shot himself
Bodies were carried out, soaked with gasoline
& burned
Third Reich surrenders in May of 1945
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FDR dies of a stroke on April 12, 1945
Harry S. Truman becomes President
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Japan conquers Hong Kong, Indochina, Malaya,
Burma, Thailand, & most of China
U.S. attacks Tokyo in response to Pearl Harbor –
called Doolittle’s Raid - 1942
Allied forces stopped Japan from taking
Australia-Battle of the Coral Sea 1942
Iwo Jima (sulfur island): “an ugly, smelly glob of
cold lava squatting in a surly ocean”
*had a large military base that U.S. needed to
invade Japan - 1945
* U.S. wins battle. Of 20,700 Japan soldiers,
only 200 survive
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April, 1945
Japan uses a new tactic: Kamikaze attacks –
suicide plane attack- crashing their planes
into Allied ships
Battle ends June, 1945 with an Allied win
7,600 Americans die
110,000 Japanese die
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Called the Manhattan Project
Research directed by J. Robert Oppenheimer
First test July 16, 1945 in New Mexico
August 6, 1945 a B-29 bomber named Enola Gay
released the atomic bomb over Hiroshima
In 43 seconds almost every building collapsed
August 9, 1945 a second atomic bomb dropped
over Nagasaki – leveled half the city
http://www.5min.com/Video/The-AtomicBombings-of-Hiroshima-119994298
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FDR, Churchill & Stalin meet in Yalta, Soviet union
Their countries called The Big Three
Discussed the fate of Germany & the post war
world
At this time Japan & Allied forces still at war
FDR prepared to make concessions to get Stalin
& Russia to help fight against Japan and
to get Stalin to join the United Nations
The Compromise: Germany is divided into four
zones (West Germany-U.S. & East Germany
(Soviet Union), Soviets would have a zone in
Korea
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Held in Nuremberg, Germany
24 surviving Nazi leaders were put on trial for
crimes against humanity
12 of the 24 sentenced to death, most of the
rest sentenced to prison
More trials as the years progressed
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After WWII, Japan is occupied by U.S. forces
under the command of General Douglas
MacArthur
Tried many Japanese soldiers, rulers, & prison
guards for crimes against citizens & POWs
MacArthur reshaped Japan’s government into
a free market system, women’s suffrage &
basic freedoms – a democracy
Japan’s constitution is known as the
MacArthur Constitution
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At the end of WWII, U.S. emerges as the world’s
dominant economic & military power
Pay for industry workers grew 10%
Farmers reaped profits due to technology & good
weather – income tripled
The war created opportunities for women in the
workforce
Mass migration: 1 million people poured into
California during 1941-44
African Americans left the south & went north for
factory jobs
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Families adjusted: teenagers left at home by
themselves due to mom working & dad in war
Rushed marriages due to the war
GI Bill of Rights: education & training for vets,
and offered home loans
Civil Rights protests: 1943 Detroit Riots
Anti-Mexican “Zoot-Suit” Riots in L.A.
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After the attack on Pearl Harbor, fear led many
U.S. citizens to believe Japanese Americans would
attack too
Fear & uncertainty led to prejudice against
Japanese-Americans
Internment of all Japanese-Americans in Hawaii
On Feb. 19, 1942, President Roosevelt signed an
order requiring removal of people of Japanese
ancestry from California, Washington, Arizona &
Oregon and sent them to relocation
camps(prison camps)