Allies Stem Japanese Tide Priority was to defeat Nazis, but US did not wait to move against Japan US submarines still existing US aircraft carriers were at sea during attack on Pearl Harbor

Japanese Advances 1st 6 months after Pearl Harbor- conquered empire that dwarfed Hitler’s Conquered most of South Pacific-as far west as Aleutians-part of Alaska

Japanese Advances Philippines-80,000 Americans commanded by General Douglas MacArthur-held out against 200,000 Japanese for 4 months

Japanese Advances 14,000 killed, another 48,000 wounded MacArthur eventually had to abandon Philippines- “I shall return” Japanese military dazzled by their success Now had 150 million new subjects spread over 1/7th of the globe

US Retaliation 4/18/42-16 bombers led by James Doolittle take off of USS Hornet Bombed Tokyo military targets Boosted American morale, caused concern among the Japanese

US Retaliation May 1942- US and Australian forces intercept Japanese fleet targeting Australia-Battle of the Coral Sea New Warfare-all fighting done with carrier-based planes-opposing ships never saw each other

US Retaliation Allies lost more ships than Japanese Japanese fleet too short of fuel to continue to Australia-1st time Japanese had been stopped Moral victory for the US

Battle of Midway June 1942- Chester Nimitz-commander of American forces in Pacific- learned Japanese invasion force heading for Midway then on to Pearl Harbor 110 Japanese ships Largest assemblage of naval power in history

Battle of Midway US outnumbered 4 to 1-prepared a surprise for Japanese at Midway Americans ordered to inflict maximum damage on the enemy

Battle of Midway Japanese lose 4 aircraft carriers, a cruiser, 322 planes Americans avenged Pearl Harbor

Island Hopping Lots of distance between island on in the Pacific Japanese troops dug in on hundreds of islands Taking each island would be long and costly

Island Hopping Americans “leapfrogged” Japanese strongholds Seized less-fortified islands, built airfields, used airpower to cut Japanese supply lines Starved out Japanese strong points

Island Hopping 1st land offensive of Japanese war- Guadalcanal in Solomon Islands 19,000 marines 6 months later-Japanese leave 1st Japanese defeat on land

Island Hopping October 1944- 178,000 Allied troops & 738 ships converge on Leyte Island in the Philippines Japanese throw entire fleet into the battle Japanese introduce kamikaze-suicide plane

Island Hopping In the Philippines- 424 kamikazes-sunk 16 US ships and damaged another 80 Leyte Gulf a disaster for Japan Lost 3 battleships 4 aircraft carriers 13 cruisers 400 planes

Island Hopping Americans next turned to Iwo Jima US could use this a s abase to attack Japan Most heavily defended spot on earth 20,700 Japanese dug into Iwo Jima 6,000 marines died taking Iwo Jima

Island Hopping 200 Japanese survived Last obstacle was Okinawa

By the way… April 12, 1945-FDR dies Harry Truman becomes president

Okinawa Japan’s last defensive outpost Unleashed 1,900 kamikazes Sunk 30 allied ships Killed 5,000 US sailors

Okinawa Fighting ends June 22, 1945 More than 7,600 Americans died 110,000 Japanese die If Okinawa was defended this fiercely, what would an invasion of Japan be like? Churchill predicted 1million American lives and 500,000 British

Manhattan Project Manhattan Project- project to develop the atomic bomb Most ambitious scientific project in history Best kept secret of he war More than 600,000 Americans were involved in the project-few actually knew the purpose

Manhattan Project Work on atomic bomb began in 1942 Group of scientists under direction of J. Robert Oppenheimer worked in a secret laboratory to build the actual bomb

Manhattan Project Many concerns surrounding atomic bomb Would it even work? If it did, would it be very strong? Would it set fire to the atmosphere? Would it destroy the earth?

Manhattan Project July 16, 1945-1st atomic bomb detonated in New Mexico Blinding flash visible from 180 miles away Bomb more powerful than anticipated

To Bomb or not to Bomb Many scientists said it would be immoral to drop the bomb without fair warning Others wanted to give the Japanese a demonstration of the bomb Problems with a test explosion: Nothing less than dropping a bomb on a city would convince Japanese to surrender The test might be a dud Japanese might shoot down delivery plan May move American prisoners to the test area

To Bomb or not to Bomb Decision was made to drop the bomb without warning Why? Save American lives Weapon needed to be used to justify cost of building it Give Americans advantage over the Soviet Union in shaping the post war world

To Bomb or not to Bomb US warns Japan that it faced “prompt and utter destruction” unless it surrendered Japan refused

Hiroshima and Nagasaki August 6, 1945 Enola Gay released atomic bomb code named Little Boy over Hiroshima an important Japanese military center 43 seconds later, the city collapsed to dust Japanese leaders still hesitated to surrender

Hiroshima and Nagasaki August 9, 1945- a second atomic bomb-Fat Man- was dropped on Nagasaki Leveled half the city By the end of 1945-200,000 people had died due to the atomic bombs

Hiroshima and Nagasaki September 2, 1945-Japanese formally surrender on board the USS Missouri

Preparing for Peace Yalta Conference-February 1945 Attended by FDR, Stalin and Churchill Created the United Nations-and international peacekeeping body

Preparing for Peace Also at Yalta-Stalin promises to enter the war against Japan In exchange for: Kuril and Sakhlin Islands Stalin also promised to allow free elections in Poland and other Soviet occupied nations

Preparing for Peace July 1945- Potsdam Conferendce Attended by Truman, Stalin, and Atlee (new British PM) Created plan to disarm Germany & eliminate Nazis

Nuremberg Trials 22 Nazi officers and govmt. Officials put on trial 12 sentenced to death For the 1st time in history, a nation’s leaders had been legally held responsible for their actions during war

Occupation of Japan Occupied by US forces Under command of Douglas MacArthur Tojo arrested and sentenced to death More than 1,100 Japanese put on trial

Occupation of Japan Occupation lasted 6 years MacArthur installed a democratic government Japanese constitution still known as the Macarthur Constitution