World War II and Restructuring the Post-War World

World War II and Restructuring the Post-War World
Pre-AP Unit #14

Nazi-Soviet Nonaggression Pact
Nazi-Soviet Nonaggression Pact – Agreement between Hitler and Stalin signed on August 23, The two nations agreed not to attack each other and to divide control of Poland between the two. The agreement enabled the Soviet Union to pursue military expansion in northeastern. By 1940 the Soviets had annexed Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, & Finland. Meanwhile, Hitler continued to believe that the West would not fight over Poland. He now feared, however, that the West and the Soviet Union might make an alliance. Such an alliance could mean a two-front war for Germany. To prevent this possibility, Hitler made his own alliance with Stalin. On August 23, 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union signed the Nazi-Soviet Nonaggression Pact. Because he expected to fight the Soviet Union anyway, it did not matter to Hitler what he promised. On September 17th, 1939, Stalin sent Soviet troops to occupy the eastern half of Poland. Stalin then moved to annex countries to the north of Poland. Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia fell without a struggle, but Finland resisted. In November, Stalin sent nearly one million Soviet troops into Finland. The Soviets expected to win a quick victory, so they were not prepared for winter fighting. This was a crucial mistake. The Finns were outnumbered and outgunned, but they fiercely defended their country. In the freezing winter weather, soldiers on skis swiftly attacked Soviet positions. In contrast, the Soviets struggled to make progress through the deep snow. The Soviets suffered heavy losses, but they finally won through sheer force of numbers. By March 1940, Stalin had forced the Finns to accept surrender terms. Closure Question #1: Why did Stalin, the leader of communist nation, make a military agreement with Adolf Hitler, a fascist who openly condemned communism?

Closure Question #2: Describe the course of World War II in Europe until the end of (At least 3 sentences) Blitzkrieg Literally meaning “Lightning War”, the Blitzkrieg was a relatively new style of warfare used by Germany that emphasized the use of speed and firepower to penetrate deep into enemy’s territory. Germany used this tactic first in invading Poland on September 1, 1939, conquering the entire country in less than one month. In 1939, finally, British and French leaders saw the need to take action. They vowed not to let Hitler take over another country without consequences. Realizing that Hitler’s next move would be against Poland, Britain and France signed an alliance with Poland, guaranteeing aid if Hitler attacked. Hitler, however, was more concerned about war with the Soviet Union than with Britain and France. Not wanting to fight a war on two fronts, Germany signed the Nazi-Soviet Nonaggression pact with the Soviets on August 23, The two former rivals publicly promised not to attack one another. Secretly, they agreed to invade and divide Poland and recognize each other’s territorial ambitions. The public agreement alone shocked the West and guaranteed a German offensive against Poland. War came to Europe in the early hours of September 1, 1939, when a massive German blitzkrieg, or sudden attack, hit Poland from three directions. Blitzkrieg means “lighting war”. It was a relatively new style of warfare that emphasized the use of speed and firepower to penetrate deep into the enemy’s territory. The newest military technologies made it devastatingly effective. Using a coordinated assault by tanks and planes, followed by motorized vehicles and infantry, Germany broke through Poland’s defenses and destroyed its air force. The situation became even more hopeless on September 17th when the Soviet Union invaded Poland from the east. Although France and Britain declared war against Germany, they did nothing to help save Poland. By the end of the month, a devastated Poland fell in defeat.

Charles de Gaulle French WWII Hero and political leader from 1946 to 1969; de Gaulle drafted the constitution for the French Fifth Republic in 1958, increasing his powers as president. He also oversaw economic growth and led the French military in development of their first atomic bomb in 1960, rebuilding France into one of the most powerful countries in the world. With the economic aid of the Marshall Plan, the countries of Western Europe recovered relatively rapidly from the devastation of World War II. Between 1947 and 1950, European countries received $9.4 billion for new equipment and raw materials. By 150, industrial output in Europe was 30% of prewar levels. This economic recovery continued well into the 1950s and 1960s. It was a time of dramatic economic growth and prosperity in Western Europe. The history of France for nearly a quarter of a century after the war was dominated by one man – the war hero Charles de Gaulle. In 1946 de Gaulle helped establish a new government, the Fourth Republic. The government, however, was largely ineffective. In 1958 leaders of the Fourth Republic, frightened by bitter divisions caused by a crisis in the French colony of Algeria, asked de Gaulle to form a new government. That year, de Gaulle drafted a new constitution for the Fifth Republic that greatly enhanced the power of the president. The French president would now have the right to choose the prime minister, dissolve parliament, and supervise both defense and foreign policy. French voters overwhelmingly approved the constitution, and de Gaulle became the first president of the Fifth Republic. As the new president, de Gaulle wanted France to be a great power once again. To achieve the status of a world power, de Gaulle invested heavily in nuclear arms. France exploded its first nuclear bomb in 1960. Closure Question #2: Describe the course of World War II in Europe until the end of (At least 3 sentences)

Closure Question #2: Describe the course of World War II in Europe until the end of (At least 3 sentences) Winston Churchill Prime Minister of Great Britain during World War II, Churchill had always warned against Hitler since the early 1930s and during the Battle of Britain from 1940 to 1941 Churchill was the lone world leader that stood against Hitler and the Axis forces. The Miracle of Dunkirk was a proud moment for Britain, but as the new prime minister Winston Churchill cautioned Parliament, “wars are not won by evacuations.” Although the British army escaped, the Germans took Paris and forced the French to surrender in the same railway car that the French had used for the German surrender in France was then divided into two sections: a larger northern section controlled by the Germans and known as Occupied France, and a smaller southern section controlled by the Germans and known as Unoccupied France, or Vichy France, after its capital city. Although Vichy France was officially neutral, it collaborated with the Nazis. France had fallen to Hitler in just 35 days. Hitler next turned his fury on Britain. After the evacuation at Dunkirk, Churchill made it clear that he had no intention of continuing the policy of appeasement. Churchill’s words stirred his nation as the British readied themselves for battle. Hitler’s plan to invade Britain, code-named Operation Sea Lion, depended upon Germany’s Luftwaffe, or air force, destroying the British Royal Air Force and gaining control over the skies above the English Channel. The Battle of Britain, then, was an air battle fought over the English Channel and Great Britain. It began in July The British lost nearly 1,000 planes, the Germans more than 1,700. Germany bombed civilian as well as military targets, destroying houses, factories, and churches and conducted a months-long bombing campaign against London itself, known as “the blitz.” But the British held on and, sensing failure, Hitler made a tactical decision to postpone the invasion of Britain indefinitely.

Closure Question #2: Describe the course of World War II in Europe until the end of (At least 3 sentences) Battle of Britain (July 1940 – June 1941) The German Air Force (Luftwaffe) bombed civilian and military targets in Great Britain in preparations for invasion. However, the British Royal Air Force’s firm resistance combined with the resilience of the British people led Hitler to abandon plans for invasion of England, making the battle a British victory. Winston Churchill referred to the United States in many of his speeches during the crisis in France and the Battle of Britain. The fight against Hitler, Churchill implied, was more than simply a European struggle. Nazi aggression threatened the freedoms and rights cherished by democratic nations everywhere. The contest was between ideologies as well as nations. President Roosevelt shared Churchill’s concerns but at the beginning of the war in Europe he understood that the majority of Americans opposed U.S. intervention. The severe economic crisis of the Great Depression had served to pin the nation’s attention firmly on domestic affairs throughout the 1930s. In addition, many believed that U.S. involvement in World War I had been a deadly, expensive mistake. The rise of fascism in Europe made the sacrifices of World War I seem even more pointless. In the 1930s, numerous books and articles presented a new theory about why the United States had become involved in World War I that disturbed many Americans. The theory held that big business had conspired to enter the war in order to make huge fortunes selling weapons. In 1934, a senate committee chaired by Gerald Nye of South Dakota looked into the question. Although the Nye Committee discovered little hard evidence, its findings suggested that “merchants of death” – American bankers and arms manufacturers – had indeed pulled the United States into World War I. The committee’s findings further reinforced isolationist sentiments.

Erwin Rommel ( ) Nicknamed “The Desert Fox”, Rommel is considered one of the most talented tactical German Generals, but was also known for his humane treatment of prisoners of war and civilians. He led German forces in North Africa until 1943, then commanded German forces against the Allied invasion on D-Day. However, in 1944 Rommel was accused of being involved in a plot to assassinate Hitler and was executed. American soldiers had to fight in many unfamiliar types of terrain. But the Sahara of North Africa – the world’s largest desert – presented special challenges: In hot, dry weather, sandstorms choked and blinded troops. In wet weather, mud halted machinery. The high visibility of the desert terrain made it difficult for troops to move without being seen. Poisonous reptiles, ants, and scorpions added to the problems. Brilliant tank strategies like Patton and Rommel were able to overcome such challenges. But the tanks themselves caused other problems, such as kicking up enormous dust clouds that could be seen for miles. In the deserts and mountains of North Africa the British had been fighting the Germans and Italians since Several goals motivated the Allied campaign in North Africa. Stalin had wanted America and Britain to relieve the Soviet Union by establishing a second front in France. However, FDR and Churchill felt they needed more time to prepare for an invasion across the English Channel. An invasion of North Africa, however, required less planning and fewer supplies. In addition, forcing Germany out of North Africa would pave the way for an invasion of Italy.

Closure Question #3: Why did the United States give more and more help to the Allies? (At least 1 sentence) Lend-Lease Act Lend-Lease Act – Passed by Congress in March 1941, the act authorized Roosevelt to “sell, transfer title to, exchange, lease, lend, or otherwise dispose of, to any such government any defense article” whenever he thought it was “necessary in the interests of the U.S.” Roosevelt used this Act to exclusively lend supplies to the Allies, making it an economic declaration of war on the Axis Powers. In the election of 1940, Republican nominee Wendell Willkie was critical of FDR’s handling of both the economy and foreign affairs but not the President’s basic positions on either. Given such little differences between candidates, American voted overwhelmingly not to change leaders in the middle of a crisis. Once safely reelected, President Roosevelt increased his support of Britain. When Britain began to run short on funds to purchase cash-and-carry goods in the United States, FDR took the opportunity to address Congress. On January 6, 1941, he spoke about “four freedoms” – freedom of speech, freedom of worship, freedom from want, and freedom from fear – that were threatened by Nazi and Japanese militarism. Roosevelt believed that the best way to stay out of the conflict with Germany was to aid Britain. Roosevelt compared America’s situation to the scenario of a fire in a neighbor’s home. If a neighbor asked to borrow your fire hose to put out the fire, you would not debate the issue or try to sell the hose. Extending help was both being a good neighbor and acting to keep the fire from spreading to your own home.

Closure Question #3: Why did the United States give more and more help to the Allies? (At least 1 sentence) Atlantic Charter Atlantic Charter – Secret pact signed by FDR and Winston Churchill in August 1941, endorsing national self-determination and an international system of “general security”. The pact signaled the deepening alliance between the U.S. and Great Britain. President Franklin D. Roosevelt denounced the aggressors, but the United States followed a strict policy of isolationism. Many Americans felt that the United States had been drawn into World War I due to economic involvement in Europe, and they wanted to prevent a recurrence. Roosevelt was convinced that the neutrality acts actually encouraged Axis aggression and wanted the acts repealed. They were gradually relaxed as the United States supplied food, ships, planes, and weapons to Britain. Hitler realized that an amphibious (land-sea) invasion of Britain could succeed only if Germany gained control of the air. At the beginning of August 1940, the Luftwaffe – the German air force – launched a major offensive. German planes bombed British air and naval bases, harbors, communication centers, and war industries.

How were Napoleon’s invasion of Russia and Hitler’s invasion of the Soviet Union similar? (At least 1 complete sentence) With the Balkans firmly in control, Hitler could move ahead with Operation Barbarossa, his plan to invade the Soviet Union. Early in the morning of June 22, 1941, the roar of German tanks and aircraft announced the beginning of the invasion. The Soviet Union was not prepared for the attack. Although it had the largest army in the world, its troops were niether well equipped nor well trained. The invasion rolled on week after week until the Germans had pushed 500 miles inside the Soviet Union. As the Soviet troops retreated, they burned and destroyed everything in the enemy’s path. The Russians had used this scorched-earth strategy against Napoleon. On September 8, German forces put Leningrad under siege. By early November, the city was completely cut off from the rest of the Soviet Union. To force a surrender, Hitler was ready to starve the city’s more than 2.5 million inhabitants. German bombs destroyed warehouses where food was stored. Desperately hungry people began eating cattle and horse feed, as well as cots and dogs and, finally, crows and rats. Nearly one million people died in Leningrad during the winter of Yet the city refused to fall. Impatient with the progress in Leningrad, Hitler looked to Moscow, the capital and heart of the soviet Union. A Nazi drive on the capital began on October 2, By December, the Germans had advanced to the outskirts of Moscow. Soviet General Georgi Zhukov counterattacked. As temperatures fell, the Germans, in summer uniforms, retreated. Ignoring Napoleon’s winter defeat 130 years before, Hitler sent his generals a stunning order: “No retreat!” German troops dug in about 125 miles west of Moscow. They held the line against the Soviets until March Hitler’s advance on the Soviet Union gained nothing but cost Germans 500,000 lives.

Closure Assignment #1 Answer the following questions based on what you have learned from Chapter 32, Section 1: 1. Why did Stalin, the leader of communist nation, make a military agreement with Adolf Hitler, a fascist who openly condemned communism? 2. Describe the course of World War II in Europe until the end of (At least 3 sentences) 3. Why did the United States give more and more help to the Allies? (At least 1 sentence)

Isoroku Yamamoto Japanese military leader who orchestrated the surprise attack on the US Naval Base at Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941. Although Japan and the United States had been allies in World War I, conflict over power in Asia and the Pacific had been brewing between the two nations for decades prior to Japan, as the area’s industrial and economic leader, resented any threats to its authority in the region. America’s presence in Guam and the Philippines and its support of China posed such a threat. Yet Japan relied on trade with the United States to supply much-needed natural resources. As war broke out in Europe, the Japanese Empire continued to grow in China and began to move into Indochina. President Roosevelt tried to stop this expansion, in July of 1940, by placing an embargo on important naval and aviation supplies to Japan, such as oil, iron ore, fuel, steel, and rubber. After Japan signed the Tripartite Pact in 1940 with Germany and Italy, FDR instituted a more extensive embargo. The embargo slowed, but did not stop, Japanese expansion as the Japanese were able to secure the resources they needed within their new possessions. In 1941, General Hideki Tojo became the Japanese prime minister. Known as “the Razor” for his sharp mind, he focused intently on military expansion but sought to keep the United States neutral. Throughout the summer of 1941, Japan and the United States attempted to negotiate an end to their disagreement, but with little success. Japan was bent on further expansion, and the United States was firmly against it. Finally, in late November 1941, Cordell Hull, the U.S. Secretary of State, rejected Japan’s latest demands. Formal diplomatic relations continued for the next week, but Tojo had given up on peace. By the beginning of December he had made the decision to deliver a decisive first blow against the U.S. As Japanese diplomats wrangled in the U.S. capital, Japan’s navy sailed for Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, the site of the United States Navy’s main Pacific base. The forces that Tojo sent to from Japan under the command of Vice Admiral Chuichi Nagumo included 6 aircraft carriers, 360 airplanes, an assortment of battleships and cruisers, and a number of submarines. Their mission was to eradicate the American naval and air presence in the Pacific with a surprise attack. Such a blow would prevent Americans from mounting a strong resistance to Japanese expansion.

Closure Question #1: Was the Japanese attack on Pearl harbor a success or failure from the Japanese point of view? Explain (At least 1 sentence) Pearl Harbor Main base of the U.S. Navy’s Pacific fleet which, on December 7th, 1941, was attacked without warning by the Japanese, leaving 2,500 Americans dead and the entire fleet out of commission for nearly six months. This event pulled the U.S. into World War II. The attackers struck with devastating power, taking the American forces completely by surprise. The Americans suffered heavy losses: nearly 2,500 people killed, 8 battleships severely damaged, 3 destroyers left unusable, 3 light cruisers damaged, and 160 aircraft destroyed and 128 more damaged. The U.S. battlefleet was knocked out of commission for nearly six months, allowing the Japanese to freely access the needed raw materials of their newly conquered territories, just as they had planned. Despite these losses, the situation was not as bad as it could have been. The most important ships – aircraft carriers – were out at sea at the time of the attack and survived untouched. In addition, seven heavy cruisers were out at sea and also avoided detection by the Japanese. Of the battleships in Pearl Harbor, only three – the USS Arizona, the USS Oklahoma, and the USS Utah – suffered irreparable damage. American submarine bases also survived the morning, as did important fuel supplies and maintenance facilities. In the final analysis, Nagumo proved too conservative. He canceled a third wave of bombers, refused to seek out the aircraft carriers, and turned back toward home because he feared an American counterstrike. The American Pacific Fleet survived.

Douglas MacArthur / Bataan Death March
Douglas MacArthur – Commander of the U.S. Army forces in Asia during WWII; MacArthur’s troops stationed in the Philipines were defeated by the Japanese in the Spring of 1942, forcing MacArthur to flee to Australia, leaving 75,000 soldiers behind as POWs. Bataan Death March – The forced 63-mile march of American and Filipino POWs through the hot Filipino rain forest in May ,000 American and Filipino troops died during the journey. With Pearl Harbor smoldering, the Japanese knew they had to move fast to gain important footholds in Asia and the Pacific. Although Japan’s population was smaller than America’s, the Japanese did have military advantages, including technologically advanced weapons and a well-trained and highly-motivated military. At the start of the Pacific war the outlook was grim for America. In December 1941, General Douglas MacArthur, commander of the United States Army forces in Asia, struggled to hold the U.S. positions in the Philippines with little support. This task grew even more daunting when the Japanese destroyed half of the army’s fighter planes in the region and rapidly took Guam, Wake Island, and Hong Kong. The main land attack came on December 22. MacArthur positioned his forces to repel the Japanese invasion, but he badly miscalculated the strength of the enemy and was forced to retreat. U.S. forces fell back from Manilla to the Bataan Peninsula and a fortification on Corregidor Island, where they dug in for a long siege. Trapped in Corregidor, Americans suffered, lacking necessary military and medical supplies and living on half and quarter rations. Although MacArthur was ordered to evacuate to Australia, the other Americans remained behind. They held out until early May 1942, when 75,000 Allied soldiers surrendered. Japanese troops forced the sick and malnourished prisoners of war, or POWs, to march 55 miles up the Bataan Peninsula to reach a railway that took them inland where they were forced march 8 more miles. More than 7,000 American and Filipino troops died during the grueling march.

Japanese Internment Camps
Closure Question #2: Do you believe that it was necessary to imprison Japanese Americans during WWII? (Explain your answer in at least 1 sentence) Japanese Internment Camps During WWII Japanese Americans living near the west coast were forced to relocate to internment camps due to fears that they might help the Japanese if a Japanese invasion of the west coast took place. The attack on Pearl Harbor spread fear across America. The federal government began drafting policies toward immigrants and aliens from the Axis nations. All resident “enemy aliens” were required to register with the government, submit to fingerprinting, and list their organizational affiliations. Originally laws made no distinction among nationalities. German, Italian, and Japanese aliens were subject to arrest or deportation if deemed dangerous to national security. Some 11,000 German immigrants and hundreds of Italian immigrants were held in camps; others faced curfews or travel restrictions. Federal orders also forced all three groups to vacate the West Coast temporarily in the winter of Once public fears subsided, FDR removed Germans and Italian from the enemy aliens list. Japanese aliens and Japanese American citizens received no such respite. Believing Japanese Americans to be inherently disloyal, West Coast leaders pressed FDR to address the “threat”. In February 1942, the President issued Executive Order 9066, designating certain areas as war zones from which anyone might be removed for any reason. By September, the government evacuated more than 100,000 Japanese Americans on the West Coast. Evacuees – including both Issei, Japanese immigrants, and Nisei, native-born American citizens of Japanese descent – were forced to sell their property at a loss and allowed to take only necessary items. Why did Japanese Americans generally face harsher treatment than Italian or German Americans? Several factors help explain the difference; racism, the smaller numbers of Japanese Americans, their lack of political clout, and their relative isolation from other Americans. In Hawaii, where Japanese Americans comprised one third of a multiracial society, they escaped a similar fate.

Battle of Midway June 4th, 1942; Considered the turning point of the war in the Pacific, the U.S. Navy, led by Admiral Chester Nimitz, successfully defended the Midway Island, a key American Naval base in the Central Pacific, from Japanese attack, sinking 4 Japanese aircraft carriers and ending Japanese threats to the American west coast. What Yamamoto did not realize was that Admiral Chester Nimitz knew the Japanese plans. Navy code breakers had intercepted the Japanese plans. To meet the expected assault, Nimitz sent his only available aircraft carriers to Midway. The Japanese navy was stretched out across more than a thousand miles, from the Aleutians to well west of Midway. American forces were all concentrated near Midway. The Japanese commenced their attack on June 4, In the most important naval battle of World War II, the United States dealt Japan a decisive defeat. Torpedo planes and dive bombers sank 4 Japanese aircraft carriers, along with all 250 aircraft on board and many of Japan’s most experienced pilots. America lost only one aircraft carrier. The first American offensive in the Pacific took place in August 1942, with an assault on Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands. After three months of intense fighting, the United States Marines drove the Japanese off the island. Guadalcanal was the first leg in a strategy to approach Japan from both the southwest Pacific and the central Pacific, using combined U.S. Marine, Navy, and Army forces. The logic behind the dual offensives was to force Japan to fight a two-front war and to capture bases from which to bomb the Japanese home islands. In jungles and coral reefs, under torrential monsoons and the blistering sun, fighting for every new piece of territory. American servicemen began their slow, painful trek toward Japan. Closure Question #3: How does the Battle of Midway illustrate the importance of intelligence gathering and espionage in modern warfare? (Explain in at least 1 sentence)

Battle of Guadalcanal (October 1942 – February 1943) Location of an important Japanese airbase in the south Pacific, US marines and Japanese troops fought for control of the island for 6 months. After losing more than 24,000 of their 36,000 soldiers, Japan finally abandoned the island. Japan treated the countries under its rule as conquered lands. Japanese leaders had hoped that their lightning strike at American bases would destroy the U.S. fleet in the Pacific. The Roosevelt administration, they thought, would now accept Japanese domination of the Pacific. The American people, in the eyes of Japanese leaders, were soft. Their easy, rich life had made them unable to fight. The Japanese miscalculated, however. The attack on Pearl Harbor unified American opinion about becoming involved in the war. Once bitterly divided over participating in the war, the American people now took up arms. Beginning in 1943, U.S. forces went on the offensive and advanced across the Pacific. As the Allied military power drew closer to the main Japanese islands in the first months of 1945, Harry S. Truman, who had become president after Roosevelt died in April, had a difficult decision to make. Should he use newly developed atomic weapons to bring the war to an end? If the United States invaded Japan, Truman and his advisers had become convinced that American troops would suffer heavy casualties. At the time, however, only two bombs were available; no one knew how effective they would be.

Closure Assignment #2 Answer the following questions based on what you have learned from Chapter 32, Section 2: Was the Japanese attack on Pearl harbor a success or failure from the Japanese point of view? Explain (At least 1 sentence) Do you believe that it was necessary to imprison Japanese Americans during WWII? (Explain your answer in at least 1 sentence) How does the Battle of Midway illustrate the importance of intelligence gathering and espionage in modern warfare? (Explain in at least 1 sentence)

Closure Question #1: How were Hitler’s racial ideas and policies connected to his concept of extreme nationalism? (At least 1 sentence) Aryan “Germanic peoples”; Nazis claimed that Aryans were a master race, superior to all others, especially Jews. From the start, the Nazi movement trafficked in hatred and anti-Semitism. Hitler blamed Jews for all the ills of Germany, from communism to inflation to abstract painting – and, especially, for the defeat of Germany in World War I. Other extremists influenced Hitler’s ideas and shared his prejudices. In the 1920s, his was just another angry voice in the Weimar Republic, advancing simplistic answers for the nation’s grave economic, political, and social troubles. In 1933, however, Hitler became chancellor of Germany. Hitler’s persecution of the Jews began as soon as he came to power. At first, his focus was economic. He urged Germans to boycott Jewish-owned businesses, and he barred Jews from jobs in civil service, banking, the stock exchange, law, journalism, and medicine. The inevitable question about the Holocaust is: Could it have been prevented? Could the nations in the democratic West – especially Britain, France, and the United States – have intervened at some point and stopped the slaughter of millions of innocent people? There are no simple answers to these questions. However, many people today believe that the West could have done more than it did. Before the war, the United States (as well as other countries) could have done more if it had relaxed its immigration policy. It could have accepted more Jewish refugees and saved the lives of many German and Austrian Jews. However, the State Department at first made a conscious effort to block Jewish immigration. Later commentators have blamed this failure to help European Jews on a variety of factors: anti-Semitism, apathy, preoccupation with the problems of the Great Depression, and a tendency to underestimate Hitler’s genocidal plans. Once the war started, news of the mass killings had filtered to the West.

Holocaust “Sacrifice by fire”; Term chosen by survivors following WWII to describe the Nazi attempt to kill all Jews under their control. From the time he came to power, Adolf Hitler had targeted Jews for persecution. By the end of the war, the Nazis had murdered 6 million Jews and 5 million other people they considered inferior. Today, we continue to remember this tragedy and seek ways to prevent anything like it from every happening again. On April 15th, 1945, American radio listeners sat stunned as newsman Edward R. Murrow told of a horror beyond belief. Murrow was reporting about his visit to the Nazi concentration camp at Buchenwald. He described the emaciated, hollow-eyed prisoners, the stink which was “beyond all description,” the children with identification numbers tattooed on their arms, and the hundreds of “bodies stacked up like cordwood.” Toward the end of his report, Murrow said: “I pray you to believe what I have said about Buchenwald. I have reported what I saw and heard, but only part of it. For most of it I have no words. Dead men are plentiful in war, but the living dead, more than twenty thousand of them in one camp… If I’ve offended you by this rather mild account of Buchenwald, I’m not in the least sorry.” –CBS Radio Broadcast, April 15th, 1945 What Edward R. Murrow saw at Buchenwald was just a fragment of the most horrific chapter in the Nazi era. In 1945, there was no word for it. Today, it is called the Holocaust. The mass murders of Jews, as well as other “undesirables”, were a direct result of a racist Nazi ideology that considered Aryans (white gentiles, especially those of Germanic, Nordic, and Anglo-Saxon blood) superior to other people.

Kristallnacht (November 9, 1938) “Night of the Broken Glass”; After a Jewish refugee was accused of killing a German diplomat in Paris, Nazi officials ordered attacks on Jews in Germany, Austria, and the Sudetenland. 1,500 synagogues & 7,500 Jewish owned businesses were destroyed, more than 200 Jews were killed, and thousands of Jews were arrested. Acts of violence against Jews were common. The most serious attack occurred on November 9th, 1938, and is known as Kristallnacht. Nazi officials ordered attacks on Jews throughout the Reich. Secret police and military units destroyed more than 1,500 synagogues and 7,500 Jewish-owned businesses, killed more than 200 Jews and injured more than 600 others. The Nazis arrested thousands of Jews. Between 1933 and 1937, about 129,000 Jews fled Germany and Nazi-controlled Austria. They included some of the most notable figures in the scientific and artistic world, including physicist Albert Einstein. More Jews would have left, but they were not generally welcomed into other countries. During the Great Depression, with jobs scarce, the United States and other countries barred their doors to many Jews. In 1939, the ocean liner St. Louis departed Germany for Cuba with more than 900 Jewish refugees on board. Only 22 of the passengers received permission to stay in Cuba. U.S. officials refused to accept any of the refugees. The ship returned to Germany. Almost 600 of the Jews aboard the St. Louis died in Nazi concentration camps. Closure Question #2: One historian has said that the Holocaust began on “the day that the Jews started to be treated differently.” Explain what this statement means and what evidence supports it. (At least 2 sentences)

Segregated Jewish areas; In the aftermath of Kristallnacht, Hitler ordered Jews in all countries to be moved to ghettos “for their own protection”, sealing them off with barbed wire and stone walls/ Ghetto The Nuremberg Laws were named for the city that served as the spiritual center of Nazism. They denied German citizenship to Jews, banned marriage between Jews and non-Jews, and segregated Jews at every level of society. Yet even these measures were not enough for Hitler. He hinted that, in the future, there might be what he called the “Final Solution to the Jewish question.” In Nazi Germany, Jews were forced to wear yellow stars with the word Jude (“Jew”). By the time of Kristallnacht, Hitler’s policy of anti-Semitism had progressed from discrimination to organized violence – but there was even worse to come. Hitler employed the full power of the state in his anti-Semitic campaigns. Newspapers printed scandalous attacks against Jews. Children in schools and the Hitler Youth movement were taught that Jews were “polluting” German society and culture. Comic books contained vile caricatures of Jews. Nazi administration in the conquered lands of the east was especially ruthless. Seen as the “living space” for German expansion, these lands were populated, Nazis thought, by racially inferior Slavic peoples. Hitler’s plans for an Aryan racial empire were so important to him that he and the Nazis began to put their racial program into effect soon after the conquest of Poland. Himmler’s task was to move the Slavic peoples out and replace them with Germans. Slavic peoples included Czech, Polish, Serbo-Croatian, Slovene, and Ukrainian. The resettlement policy was first applied to the lands of western Poland. Hundreds of thousands of ethinc Germans (German descendants who had migrated years ago from Germany to different parts of southern and eastern Europe) were brought into colonize the German provinces in Poland. By 1942, two million ethnic Germans had been settled in Poland.

Concentration Camp Prison where members of specially designated groups were confined. The year he became chancellor (1933), Hitler opened the first Nazi concentration camp to imprison political opponents and turn them into “useful members of society.” Camp administrators tattooed numbers on the arms of prisoners and dressed them in vertically striped uniforms with triangular insignias. For example, political prisoners wore red insignias, homosexuals pink, Jews yellow, and Jehovah’s Witnesses purple. Inside the walls of the concentration camps, there were no real restraints on sadistic guards. They tortured and even killed prisoners with no fear of reprisals from their superiors. Death by starvation and disease was an everyday occurrence. In addition, doctors at camps such as Dachau conducted horrible medical experiments that either killed inmates or left them deformed. Prisoners were made subjects of bogus experiments on oxygen deprivation, hypothermia, and the effects of altitude. Bodies were mutilated without anesthesia. Thousands of prisoners died in agonizing pain, including some 5,000 mentally or physically disabled children. Closure Question #3: Do you think that the U.S. military should have decided to bomb railway lines leading to the death camps? Why or Why not? (At least 1 sentence)

“Final Solution” / Genocide
“Final Solution” – Adolf Hitler’s plan to “cleanse” Europe of the Jewish race in an efficient and thorough manner. The Holocaust is an example of a genocide (i.e. The willful annihilation of a racial, political, or cultural group.) Since 1933, the Nazis had denied Jews the rights of citizenship and committed acts of brutality against them. These acts of persecution were steps toward Hitler’s “Final Solution to the Jewish question”: nothing short of the systematic extermination of all Jews living in the regions controlled by the Third Reich. In 1933, the year he became chancellor, Hitler opened the first Nazi concentration camps, where members of specially designated groups were confined. The earliest camps included Dachau, Sachsenhausen, and Buchenwald. Later, Ravensbruck, not far from Berlin, was opened for female prisoners. In theory, the camps were designed not to kill prisoners, but to turn them into “useful members” of the Third Reich. The Nazis imprisoned political opponents such as labor leaders, socialists, and communists, as well as anyone – journalists or novelists, ministers or priests – who spoke out against Hitler. Many Jews as well as Aryans who had intimate relations with Jews were sent to camps. Other groups targeted as “undesirable” included Gypsies, Jehovah’s Witnesses, homosexuals, beggars, drunkards, conscientious objectors, the physically disabled, and people with mental illness.

Death Camp/Auschwitz Nazi concentration camp in which prisoners were systematically exterminated. Auschwitz in southern Poland was the largest of these camps. At least 11 million Europeans, including 6 million Jews, were murdered by the Nazis by 1945. When Germany invaded Poland and the Soviet Union, the Nazis gained control of large territories that were home to millions of Jews. Under Nazi rule, Jews in Warsaw, Lodz, and other Polish cities were forced to live in crowded, walled ghettos. Nazis also constructed additional concentration camps in Poland and Eastern Europe. At first, the murder of Jews and other prisoners tended to be more arbitrary than systematic. But at the Wannsee Conference in January 1942, Nazi leaders made the decision to move toward Hitler’s “Final Solution”. Reinhard Heydrich, an SS leader known as “the man with an iron heart,” outlined a plan to exterminate about 11,000,000 Jews. Although the minutes of the meeting do not use the word “kill”, everyone there understood that killing was their goal. Many concentration camps, especially in Poland, were designated as death camps. The largest death camp was Auschwitz in southern Poland. Others included Treblinka, Maidenek, Sobibor, Belsec, and Chelmno. Prisoners from various parts of the Reich were transported by trains to the death camps and murdered. Nazis forced prisoners into death chambers and pumped in carbon monoxide or crammed the prisoners into showerlike facilities and released the insecticide Zyklon B. Some concentration camps that the Nazis converted into death camps did not have gassing equipment. In these camps, Nazi guards shot hundreds of thousands of prisoners. Nazi “Action Groups” that followed the army into Eastern Europe also shot several million Jews and buried them in ditches. In fully functioning death camps, the bodies of murdered prisoners were farther desecrated. Human fat was turned into soap; human hair was woven into wigs, slippers, and mattresses; cash, gold fillings, wedding rings, and other valuables were stripped off the victims. After the Nazis had taken what they wanted, they burned the bodies in crematories

Closure Assignment #3 Answer the following questions based on what you have learned from Chapter 32, Section 3: How were Hitler’s racial ideas and policies connected to his concept of extreme nationalism? (At least 1 sentence) One historian has said that the Holocaust began on “the day that the Jews started to be treated differently.” Explain what this statement means and what evidence supports it. (At least 2 sentences) Do you think that the U.S. military should have decided to bomb railway lines leading to the death camps? Why or Why not? (At least 1 sentence)

Battle of Stalingrad The True turning point of WWII in Europe; Breaking their prior treaty, Germany invaded Russia in 1941 but was stopped at Stalingrad by the bitter cold of the Russian winter and the superior number of Russian soldiers, surrendering on January 31, 1943. Germany had attacked Russia in June 1941, sending one army north toward Leningrad, a second east toward Moscow, and a third south toward Stalingrad. Although Hitler’s forces penetrated deep into Soviet territory, killing or capturing millions of soldiers and civilians, they did not achieve their main objective of conquering the Soviet Union. Soviet resistance and a brutal Russia winter stopped the German advance. In 1942, Hitler narrowed his sights and concentrated his armies in southern Russia. His goal this time was to control the rich Caucasus oil fields. To achieve this objective, he would have to capture the city of Stalingrad. The struggle for Stalingrad was especially ferocious. German troops advanced slowly fighting bitter block-by-block, house-by-house battles in the bombed-out buildings and rubble. Soviet troops then counterattacked, trapping the German forces. Yet Hitler refused to allow his army to retreat. Starving, sick, and suffering from frostbite, the surviving German troops finally surrendered on January 31, The battle of Stalingrad was the true turning point of the war in Europe. It ended any realistic plans Hitler had of dominating Europe. Nazi armies were forced to retreat westward back toward Germany. Instead, it was the Soviet Union that now went on the offensive.

Allied Powers/ Yalta Conference
Closure Question #1: Identify one possible consequence of the Allied disagreements at Yalta. (At least 1 sentence) Allied Powers – Alliance that originally only included Britain and France, but eventually several other nations including the Soviet Union, the United States, and China during WWII. Yalta Conference - February 1945 meeting of the leaders of the three Allied powers: Joseph Stalin (U.S.S.R.), Winston Churchill (U.K.), and Franklin D. Roosevelt (U.S.A.). The three agreed that after WWII Eastern European countries, such as Poland and Bulgaria, would hold free elections. Stalin never kept this promise, instead keeping Soviet troops in these countries and establishing communist governments controlled by the U.S.S.R. World War II differed from World War I in several ways. One major difference was that it was fought to the bitter end. In 1918, the Kaiser had surrendered before the Allies could invade Germany. By contrast, in World War II, Japan and Germany kept fighting long after their defeat was certain. In the last year of the war, they lost battle after battle, retreated from the lands they had conquered, and saw the slow destruction of their military forces. Allied bombing devastated their cities and industries. Yet Germany fought on until Hitler committed suicide, and Japan refused to surrender until after the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The protracted fight gave the Allies time to make plans for a postwar world. Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin met at Yalta on the Black Sea in February 1945 to discuss final strategy and crucial questions concerning postwar Germany, Eastern Europe, and Asia. At the Yalta Conference, the Big Three agreed that Poland, Bulgaria, and Romania would hold free elections. However, Stalin later reneged on this promise. Roosevelt and Churchill were not in a good position to press Stalin too hard. The Red Army already occupied much of Eastern Europe, and Roosevelt wanted Soviet help in the war against Japan. Vague promises were about as much as Stalin would give.

Dwight D. Eisenhower ( ) Commander of successful American invasions in North Africa & Italy; Eisenhower became Supreme Commander of all Allied forces in Europe in 1944, directing the D-Day invasion of Europe. “Ike” went on to serve as President of the USA after the war from 1952 to 1960. As a young man,. Dwight Eisenhower had not been considered a brilliant student at the U.S. Military Academy at West point. During the 1930s, though, his career rose due to his organizational skills and ability to work with others. In 1942, Ike was given command of all American forces in Europe – even though more than 350 other generals had more seniority. In October 1942, the British won a major victory at El Alamein in Egypt and began to push westward. The next month, Allied troops landed in Morocco and Algeria and began to move east toward key German positions. An energetic American officer, General Dwight D. Eisenhower – known as Ike – commanded the Allied invasion of North Africa. In February 1943, German general Erwin Rommel (known as the Desert Fox) led his Afrika Korps against the Americans at the Kasserine Pass in Tunisia. Rommel broke through the American lines in an attempt to reach the Allied supply base at Tebessa in Algeria. Finally, American soldiers stopped the assault. Lack of supplies then forced Rommel to retreat.

D-Day (June 6, 1944) The first day of the Allied invasion of western Europe; American, British, Canadian and Polish troops landed on the northern coast of France (Normandy), suffering heavy casualties but eventually overrunning German defenses and beginning the push east to Germany. Six months after the Teheran Conference, the plan to open a second front in France became reality. The massive Allied invasion of France was given the code name Operation Overlord. Overlord involved the most experienced Allied officers in Europe. American General Dwight D. Eisenhower again served as Supreme Commander. British General Bernard Montgomery served as commander of the ground forces, while General Omar Bradley led the United States First Army. Overlord involved landing 21 American divisions and 26 British, Canadian, and Polish divisions on a 50-mile stretch of beaches in Normandy. The fleet was the largest ever assembled, comprising more than 4,400 ships and landing crafts. The plan dictated striking five beaches in Normandy (code-named Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juno, and Sword). On D-Day the Allies hit Germany in force. More than 11,000 planes prepared the way, attempting to destroy the German communication and transportation networks and soften Nazi beach defenses. At 6:30 AM, after a rough crossing of the English Channel, the first troops landed. On four of the beaches, the landings were only lightly opposed and casualties relatively low. But at Omaha, one of the two beaches assigned to American forces, the German offered stiff opposition. On the cliffs overlooking the beach, the Germans had dug trenches and built small concrete pillbox structures from which heavy artillery could be fired. They had the beach covered with a wide variety of deadly guns. They had also heavily mined the beaches. When the first American soldiers landed, they stepped out of their landing crafts into a rainstorm of bullets, shells, and death. Some crafts dumped their occupants too far from the beach; soldiers, weighted down by heavy packs, drowned. One writer called D-Day “the longest day.”

George S. Patton Jr. ( ) Following Eisenhower’s advancement to Supreme Commander, Paton was given command of all US mechanized units (tanks) in Europe. Paton combined innovative tank tactics with single-minded devotion to duty and victory, earning the nickname of “Blood and Guts”. The fighting at the Kasserine Pass taught American leaders valuable lessons. They needed aggressive officers and troops better trained for desert fighting. To that end, Eisenhower put American forces in North Africa under the command of George S. Paton Jr. Patton told his junior officers in 1943: “You usually will know where the front is by the sound of gunfire, and that’s the direction you should proceed. Now, suppose you lose a hand or an ear is shot off or perhaps a piece of your nose, and you think you should walk back to get first aid, if I see you, it will be the last… walk you’ll ever take.” Patton’s forces advanced east with heightened confidence. Simultaneously the British pressed westward from Egypt, trapping Axis forces in a continually shrinking pocket in Tunisia. Rommel escaped, but his army did not. In May 1943, German and Italian forces – some 240,000 troops – surrendered.

Battle of the Bulge (December 1944) The last desperate counterattack by the German army against the Allies on the western front; German tanks barreled through the Ardennes forest, retaking several towns before being stopped by American forces at the Belgian town of Bastogne and pushed back into Germany. After D-Day, Germany faced a hopeless two-front war. Soviet solders were advancing steadily from the east, forcing German armies out of Latvia, Romania, Slovakia, and Hungary. Mile by mile, Germany lost the lands it had once dominated and the natural resources it had once plundered. Allied armies were also on the move in the west. In August 1944, the Allies liberated Paris. Hitler had ordered his generals to destroy the French capital, but they disobeyed him, leaving the “City of Lights” as beautiful as ever. As Parisians celebrated, Allied troops kept advancing. As a mood of hopelessness fell over Germany, Rommel and other leading generals plotted to overthrow Hitler. On July 20, 1944, an officer planted a bomb at Hitler’s headquarters. The explosion killed or wounded 20 people, but Hitler survived. Rommel took poison to escape being put on trial. Claiming that fate was on his side, Hitler refused to surrender to the advancing troops. In December 1944, Hitler ordered a counter-attack. With Allied troops strung out between the English Channel and the Alps, German forces massed near the Ardennes. Hitler’s scenario called for English-speaking German soldiers in U.S. uniforms to cut telephone lines, change road signs, and spread confusion. German tanks would then secure communication and transportation hubs. The counterattack, known as the Battle of the Bulge, almost succeeded. The Germans caught the Allies by surprise, created a bulge in the American line, and captured several key towns. Snowy, cloudy skies prevented the Allies from exploiting their air superiority. But at the Belgian town of Bastogne American forces held despite frostbite and brutal German assaults. Then, on December 23, the skies cleared and Allied bombers attacked German positions. After reinforcements arrived, the Allies went back on the offensive, steadily pushing the Germans out of France. The Battle of the Bulge was a desperate attempt to drive a wedge between American and British forces. Instead, it crippled Germany by using its reserves and demoralizing its troops. Ultimately, it shortened the time Hitler had left.

V-E Day A week after Adolf Hitler and his wife committed suicide in Berlin rather than be captured, on May 7, 1945, in a little French schoolhouse that had served as Eisenhower’s head-quarters, what remained of the leadership of Nazi Germany surrendered. The Allied Powers celebrated V-E (Victory in Europe) Day. Sadly, FDR did not see the momentous day. He had died a few weeks earlier. It would be up to the new President, Harry S. Truman, to see the nation through to final victory. By January, the Soviet Army had reached the Oder River outside Berlin. The Allies also advanced northward in Italy. In April 1945, Mussolini tried to flee to Switzerland but was captured and executed. By this time, American and British troops had crossed the Rhine River into Germany. In April, a U.S. army reached the Elbe River, 50 miles west of Berlin. Allied forces were now in position for an all-out assault against Hitler’s capital. Hitler was by now a physical wreck; shaken by tremors, paranoid from drugs, and kept alive by mad dreams of a final victory. He gave orders that no one followed and planned campaigns that no one would ever fight. Finally, on April 30, he and a few of his closest associates committed suicide. His “Thousand Year Reich” had lasted only a dozen years. Closure Question #2: How were the final phases of the war in Europe similar to the final phases of the war in the Pacific? How were they different? (At least 2 sentences)

Kamikaze “Divine Wind”; Japanese suicide-bomber pilots who deliberately crashed their planes full of jet fuel into American ships in the Pacific during the late stages of WWII. The fight Okinawa in April 1945 was even deadlier than Iwo Jima. Only 340 miles from Japan, Okinawa contained a vital air base, necessary for the planned invasion of Japan. Taking Okinawa was the most complex and costly operation in the Pacific campaign, involving half a million troops and 1,213 warships. U.S. forces finally took Okinawa but at a cost of roughly 50,000 casualties. From Okinawa and other Pacific bases, American pilots could bomb the Japanese home islands. Short on pilots and aircraft, low on fuel and ammunition, Japan was virtually defenseless. American bombers hit factories, military bases, and cities. In a single night in March 1945, B-29 bombers destroyed 16 square miles of Tokyo. The raid killed over 83,000 Japanese – more than either of the later atomic bombs – and injured 100,000 more.Advances in technology, as well as the troops helped determine the outcome of World War II. Allied and Axis scientists labored to make planes faster, bombs deadlier, and weapons more accurate. The most crucial scientific development was the atomic bomb.

Island Hopping U.S. strategy in the Pacific against Japan; The Navy captured some Japanese-held islands while ignoring others in a steady path toward Japan from 1942 to 1945. While war still raged in Europe, American forces in the Pacific had been advancing in giant leaps. From Tarawa and Makin in the Gilbert Islands, American forces jumped ahead to Eniwetok and Kwajalein in the Marshall Islands. Then, they took another leap to Saipan, Tinian, and Guam in the Mariana Islands. American forces took each island only after a nearly unbelievable life-and-death struggle. Time and again, Japanese defenders fought virtually to the last man. Rather than surrender, many Japanese troops readily killed themselves. At the same time, Japanese kamikaze pilots deliberately crashed their planes into American ships. By the end of the war, more than 3,000 Japanese pilots had died in kamikaze missions. There deaths, however, did not prevent General Douglas MacArthur from retaking the Philippines or the United States Navy from sinking Japanese ships. One of the fiercest battles in the island-hopping campaign took place in February and March On Iwo Jima, a five-mile-long island 650 miles southeast of Tokyo, United States Marines faced a dug-in, determined enemy. In 36 days of fighting, more than 23,000 marines became casualties. But they took the island. The famous photograph of six marines (including Native American, Ira Hayes) planting the American flag on Iwo Jima symbolized the heroic sacrifice of American soldiers.

Battle of Iwo Jima Battle of Iwo Jima – (February-March, 1945) One of the fiercest battles of the U.S. island-hopping campaign. In 36 days of fighting on this 5-mile-long island 23,000 marines became casualties. The famous photograph of six marines (including Native American and Arizonan Ira Hayes) planting the American flag on Iwo Jima symbolized the heroic sacrifice of American soldiers. While war still raged in Europe, American forces in the Pacific had been advancing in giant leaps. From Tarawa and Makin in the Gilbert Islands, American forces jumped ahead to Eniwetok and Kwajalein in the Marshall Islands. Then, they took another leap to Saipan, Tinian, and Guam in the Mariana Islands. American forces took each island only after a nearly unbelievable life-and-death struggle. Time and again, Japanese defenders fought virtually to the last man. Rather than surrender, many Japanese troops readily killed themselves. At the same time, Japanese kamikaze pilots deliberately crashed their planes into American ships. By the end of the war, more than 3,000 Japanese pilots had died in kamikaze missions. There deaths, however, did not prevent General Douglas MacArthur from retaking the Philippines or the United States Navy from sinking Japanese ships. One of the fiercest battles in the island-hopping campaign took place in February and March On Iwo Jima, a five-mile-long island 650 miles southeast of Tokyo, United States Marines faced a dug-in, determined enemy. In 36 days of fighting, more than 23,000 marines became casualties. But they took the island. The famous photograph of six marines (including Native American, Ira Hayes) planting the American flag on Iwo Jima symbolized the heroic sacrifice of American soldiers.

Manhattan Project / Harry S. Truman
Harry Truman - ( ) Vice-President to FDR, Truman became president following Roosevelt’s death in April 1945 and served until January Truman received Germany’s surrender in May 1945 & Japan’s surrender in August 1945, and was the first President of the Cold War era, but he is best known for making the decision to use the Atomic Bomb against Japan. Manhattan Project - The atomic bomb began with an idea. In the early 1930s, scientists learned how to split the nuclei of certain elements. They also discovered that this process of nuclear fission released tremendous energy. They learned more about the nature of the atom, the effect of a chain reaction, and the military use of uranium. Early in the war, Albert Einstein signed a letter that alerted Roosevelt about the need to proceed with atomic development. In 1942, FDR gave the highest national priority to the development of an atomic bomb. The program, code-named the Manhattan Project, cost several billion dollars & employed tens of thousands of people.

Potsdam Conference (July 1945) First meeting between the new U.S. President, Harry Truman, and Joseph Stalin. The Allies agreed to divide Germany into 4 zones of occupation, establish new borders for Poland & support free elections there, and permit the Soviets to claim reparations for war damages from their zone of occupation in Germany. A dramatically altered Big Three met in the Berlin Suburb of Potsdam. Although Stalin remained in power in the Soviet Union, Harry S. Truman had become U.S. President upon the death of FDR. After the start of the conference, Clement Atlee replaced Churchill as prime minister of Britain. While in Potsdam, Truman learned of the successful test of the atomic bomb. But he was more focused on Europe and the Soviet Union than on Asia. Though in the conference Stalin reaffirmed his pledge to enter the war against Japan, the Potsdam Conference is remembered for increasing tension between the Soviets and Americans. After the war ended in August 1945, plans for the postwar world had to be turned into realities. However, the changes that took place were not often what the Allies had envisioned at Yalta and Potsdam. World War II altered the political realities of the world. The borders of Poland, for example, shifted slightly to the west. In time differences between the Soviet Union and its former Allies led to the division of Germany into two countries: communist East Germany and noncommunist West Germany. Nearly all the nations of Eastern Europe became communist states under Soviet control. Other countries experienced profound political changes. In China, a long-standing civil war between Nationalists and communists resumed. In Japan, General Douglas MacArthur headed an American military occupation and supervised the writing of a new constitution. It abolished the armed forces except for purposes of defense, gave women the right to vote, enacted democratic reforms, and established the groundwork for full economic recovery.

Hiroshima / Nagasaki Hiroshima (August 6, 1945) – Site of the first atomic-bomb attack. The bomb exploded at 9:14 A.M. By 9:16 A.M. more than 60,000 of Hiroshima’s 344,000 residents were dead or missing. An estimated total of 140,000 residents were killed by the blast and the radiation poisoning that followed, and 69% of the city’s buildings were completely destroyed. Nagasaki (August 9, 1945) – Second atomic-bomb attack site. 35,000 were killed by the blast, with a total of nearly 75,000 killed by the blast and radiation. The destruction, coupled with a declaration of war by the Soviet Union on the same day, led the Japanese to surrender on August 15th, officially ending WWII.

V-J Day Following the bombing of Hiroshima Japanese leaders debated whether to surrender or continue to fight for 3 more days. Then, on August 9th, two events rocked Japan. First, the Soviet Union declared war against Japan and invaded Manchuria. Next, the United States dropped a second atomic bomb on Nagasaki. Debate continued at the highest levels of Japanese government. Finally, Emperor Hirohito made the decision to surrender. On August 15, the Allies celebrated V-J (Victory in Japan) Day. Japan officially surrendered on September 2nd aboard the USS Missouri. The most costly war in history was over. As many as 60,000,000 people, mostly civilians, had died in the conflict. Closure Question #2: How were the final phases of the war in Europe similar to the final phases of the war in the Pacific? How were they different? (At least 2 sentences)

Closure Assignment #4 Answer the following questions based on what you have learned from Chapter 32, Section 4: Identify one possible consequence of the Allied disagreements at Yalta. (At least 1 sentence) How were the final phases of the war in Europe similar to the final phases of the war in the Pacific? How were they different? (At least 2 sentences) Did President Truman make the correct decision in using the atomic bomb? Why or why not?

Refugees/Nazi Collaborators
Refugees – Survivors of war who either or no longer welcome in their home country or whose home country no longer exists; In the aftermath of World War II millions of Europeans found themselves homeless and penniless. Nazi Collaborators – People who assist the enemy; During WWII many non-German Europeans aided the SS in locating and arresting Jewish Europeans. After the war collaborators became targets of an anti-Nazi backlash throughout Europe. The Nazis were responsible for the deliberate death by shooting, starvation, or overwork of at least nine to ten million non-Jewish people. The Nazis considered the Roma (sometimes known as Gypsies), like the Jews, to be an alien race. About 40% of Europe’s one million Roma were killed in the death camps. The leading citizens of the Slavic peoples – the clergy, intellectuals, civil leaders, judges, and lawyers – were arrested and killed. Probably an additional four million Poles, Ukrainians, and Belorussians lost their lives as slave laborers. Finally, at least three or four million Soviet prisoners of war were killed. Closure Question #1: Why do you think so many Europeans favored communism after World War II? (At least 1 complete sentence)

Nuremberg Trials Trials of Nazis for war crimes in violation of the Geneva Convention. The trials, which were followed closely by Americans, highlighted the horrors of the Holocaust. Though most of the defendants pleaded that they were only following orders and that Hitler was to blame for all crimes, virtually all accused were convicted and sentenced to either death by hanging or long prison sentences. In the effort to create a better world, the Allies did not forget to punish the people who had caused so much destruction and death. During the war, the Axis Powers had repeatedly violated the Geneva Convention. The Allies tried more than a thousand Japanese citizens for committing atrocities in China, Korea, and Southeast Asia and brutally mistreating prisoners of war. Hundreds were condemned to death, including Prime Minister Hideki Tojo and the general responsible for the Bataan Death March. Americans more closely followed the Nuremberg Trials, held in the German town that was the spiritual center of the Nazi movement. The trials turned a glaring spotlight on the evils of the Third Reich. The first of the Nuremberg Trials involved key leaders of Nazi Germany, such as Hermann Goring. In the following decades, Allied or Israeli authorities captured and tried such other Nazis as Adolf Eichmann, a leading architect of the “Final Solution.” The periodic trials kept alive the memory of the Nazi crimes against humanity. Closure Question #2: Do you think it was right for the Allies to try only Nazi and Japanese leaders for war crimes? Why or why not? (At least 1 sentence)

Israel Jewish nation established in Palestine in 1948 with the support of all 3 Allied Powers; Arab Muslims, who had controlled the region for nearly 1800 years, were forced out of the area, sparking conflict in the region and Muslim resentment towards the United States. For most Americans, the enormity of the Nazi crime became real only when soldiers began to liberate the concentration camps that dotted the map of Germany. When they saw it all – the piles of dead bodies, the warehouses full of human hair and jewelry, the ashes in crematoriums, the half-dead emaciated survivors – they realized as never before that evil was more than an abstraction. Hardened by war, accustomed to the sight and smell of death, the soldiers who liberated the camps were nevertheless unprepared for what they saw. The liberation of the camps led to an outpouring of American sympathy and sincere longing to aid the victims. Many survivors found temporary or permanent homes in the United States. The revelation of the Holocaust also increased demand and support for an independent Jewish homeland. In 1948, when the Jewish community in Palestine proclaimed the State of Israel, President Truman immediately recognized the new nation. The United States became perhaps the staunches ally of the new Jewish state.

The Holocaust /11/01?? April 11th, 1945 – American soldiers liberate Buchenwald Concentration Camp, the first direct exposure to the Holocaust by American citizens. May 7th, 1945 – Germany officially surrenders, ending the war in Europe. Approximately 3 million Jewish refugees were freed from Concentration Camps. November 29th, 1947 – The United Nations, due to pressure from U.S. President Harry Truman, recognizes the formation of the Jewish state of Israel, leading 250,000 Muslim Arabs to leave their homes in the third-holiest city of the Islamic Faith, Jerusalem. To this day, most Arab nations refuse to recognize the sovereignty of the Jewish state of Israel. 1967; ; 1973; 1977; 1981; 1982; 1987; 1991; 2006; 2009 – Years in which the nation of Israel has been engaged in official warfare with Muslim nations, including Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Iraq, Palestine, & Lebanon. In each of these conflicts the United States has supported Israel. September 11th, 2001 – Saudi Arabian Muslims, funded by the terrorist group Al Qaeda, carry out kamikaze attacks on the Twin Towers in New York and the Pentagon in Washington. One of the justifications given by Al Qaeda for carrying out acts of terrorism against the United States is that the USA continues to support the “illegal” Jewish state of Israel.

Demilitarization/ Democratization
Demilitarization – Disbanding a nation’s armed forces; As a condition of their surrender, Japan agreed to completely break-up its military, leaving Japan with only a small police force while the United States, under the command of General Douglas MacArthur, established military bases throughout the country. Democratization – The Process of creating a government elected by the people. In February 1946, MacArthur and his American political advisers drew up a new constitution, changing Japan into a constitutional monarchy similar to Great Britain. MacArthur was not told to revive the Japanese economy. However, he was instructed to broaden land ownership and increase the participation of workers and farmers in the new democracy. To this end, MacArthur put forward a plan that required absentee landlords with huge estates to sell land to the government. The government then sold the land to tenant farmers at reasonable prices. Other reforms pushed by MacArthur gave workers the right to create independent labor unions.

United Nations International organization established in April 1945 which, many hoped, would succeed where the League of Nations had failed in preventing warfare and resolving conflict between nations. The five major WWII allies – the U.S.A., U.S.S.R., Britain, France, and China – make up the most powerful arm of the U.N., the Security Council. The United States led the charge for the establishment of the United Nations. In April 1945, delegates from 50 nations met in San Francisco to write the charter for the UN. The Senate overwhelmingly ratified the charter, and the UN later set up its permanent home in New York City. The United Nations was organized on the basis of cooperation between the Great Powers, not on the absolute equality of all nations. All member nations sat on the General Assembly. However, the five major World War II Allies were assigned permanent seats on the most powerful arm of the UN, the Security Council. Closure Question #3: Why do you think Americans supported participation in the UN after WWII when they had opposed participation in the League of Nations after World War I? (At least 1 sentence)

Closure Assignment #5 Answer the following questions based on what you have learned from Chapter 32, Section 5: Why do you think so many Europeans favored communism after World War II? (At least 1 complete sentence) Do you think it was right for the Allies to try only Nazi and Japanese leaders for war crimes? Why or why not? (At least 1 sentence) Why do you think Americans supported participation in the UN after WWII when they had opposed participation in the League of Nations after World War I? (At least 1 sentence)

The Trial of Harry Truman

Iron Curtain Term first used by Winston Churchill to describe Soviet domination of Eastern Europe. The “Iron Curtain” prevented the entrance of western ideas to the east & did not allow east Europeans to travel to the west during the Cold War. Truman left Potsdam believing that the Soviet Union was “planning world conquest” and that the alliance with the Soviet Union was falling apart. With the Soviet Red Army at his command, Stalin seemed to present a real threat. Thus, the state was set for a worldwide rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union. The 46-year struggle became known as the Cold War because the two superpowers never faced each other directly in a “hot” military conquest. President Truman was no the only world leader who believed that Stalin had aspirations toward world domination. Winston Churchill also spoke out forcefully against the Soviet Union. On March 5, 1946, he gave an important speech at Fulton College in Missouri, Truman’s home state. Referring to a map of Europe, Churchill noted that “an iron curtain has descended across the Continent. East of that iron curtain, the Soviet Union was gaining more control by installing communist governments and police states and by crushing political and religious dissent. In addition, Churchill feared the Soviets were attempting to spread communism to Western Europe and East Asia. The only solution, Churchill said, was for the United States and other democratic countries to stand firm. Truman shared Churchill’s beliefs. Born in a small town in Missouri, Truman had been too poor to attend college. He was the only president in the twentieth century with no college education. Instead, he worked the family farm, fought in France during World War I, and eventually began a political career. His life was a testament to honesty, integrity, hard work, and a willingness to make difficult decisions. “The buck stops here,” was his motto as President. It meant that the person sitting in the Oval Office had the obligation to face problems head-on and make hard decisions.

Containment Closure Question #1: In your opinion, why did the United States assume global responsibility for containing communism? (At least 1 sentence)

Truman Doctrine Truman Doctrine - U.S. Foreign Policy during the Cold War; The United States gave monetary aid to nations struggling against communist movements in an effort to keep communism from spreading. Known to the Soviets as the Great Patriotic War, the German-Soviet war witnessed the greatest land battles in history, as well as incredible ruthlessness. The initial military defeats suffered by the Soviet Union led to drastic emergency measures that affected the lives of the civilian population. The city of Leningrad, for example, experienced 900 days of siege. Its inhabitants became so desperate for food that they even ate dogs, cats, and mice. Probably 1.5 million people died in the city. As the Germany army made its rapid advance into Soviet territory, Soviet workers dismantled and shipped the factories in the western part of the Soviet Union to the interior – to the Urals, western Siberia, and the Volga regions. Machines were placed on the bare ground. As laborers began their work, walls went up around them. The home front in the United States was quite different from that of the other major powers. The United States was not fighting on its own territory. Eventually, the United states became the arsenal of the Allied Closure Question #2: How did World War II affect the world balance of power? Which nations emerged from the conflict as world powers? (At least 2 sentences)

Marshall Plan (1948) Named for its creator, Secretary of State John C. Marshall, through the Plan the United States gave about $13 billion in grants and loans to nations in Western Europe to help them rebuild following World War II & maintain democratic governments. The containment policy’s first great success was in Western Europe. After World War II, people there confronted severe shortages of food, fuel, and medical supplies, as well as brutally cold winters. In this environment of desperate need, Secretary of State George C. Marshall unveiled a recovery plan for Europe. In a speech at Harvard University he warned that without economic health, “there can be no political stability and no assured peace.” The Marshall Plan provided food to reduce famine, fuel to heat houses and factories, and money to jump-start economic growth. Aid was also offered to the Soviet satellite states in Eastern Europe, but Stalin refused to let them accept it. The Marshall Plan provided a vivid example of how U.S. aid could serve the ends of both economic and foreign policy. The aid helped countries that desperately needed assistance. The prosperity it stimulated then helped the American economy by increasing trade. Finally, the good relationships that the aid created worked against the expansion of communism. The front lines of the Cold War were located in Germany. The zones that were controlled by France, Britain, and the United States were combined to form West Germany. West Germany was bordered on the east by the Soviet controlled East Germany. The Allies also controlled the western part of Berlin, a city tucked deep inside communist East Germany.

Cold War Ideological conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union which dominated world affairs from the end of World War II until the 1980s. The Marshall Plan was not meant to exclude the Soviet Union or its economically and politically dependent Eastern European satellite states. Those states refused to participate; however, According to the Soviet view, the Marshall Plan guaranteed “American loans in return for the relinquishing by the European states of their economic and labor also their political independence.” The Soviets saw the Marshall Plan as an attempt to buy the support of countries. In 1949 the Soviet Union responded to the Marshall Plan by founding the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (COMECON) for the economic cooperation of the Eastern European states. COMECON largely failed, however, because the Soviet Union was unable to provide much financial aid. By 1947, the split in Europe between the United States and the Soviet Union had become a fact of life. In July 1947, George Kennan, a well-known U.S. diplomat with much knowledge of Soviet affairs, argued for a policy of containment to keep communism within its existing boundaries and prevent further Soviet aggressive moves. Containment became U.S. policy. The fate of Germany also became a source of heated contention between the Soviets and the West. At the end of the war, the Allied Powers had divided Germany into four zones, each occupied by one of the Allies – the United States, the Soviet Union, Great Britain, and France. Berlin, located deep inside the Soviet zone, was also divided into four zones. The foreign ministers of the four occupying powers met repeatedly in an attempt to arrive at a final peace treaty with Germany but had little success. By February 1948, Great Britain, France, and the United States were making plans to unify the three Western sections of Germany (and Berlin) and create a West German government.

Berlin Airlift (June 1948 – May 1949) U.S. and British planes supplied Democratic West Berlin with food, fuel, medical supplies, clothing, and other necessities through airplane deliveries, thwarting Stalin’s attempt to blockade the city, which was located in the middle of Communist East Germany. The front lines of the Cold War were located in Germany. The zones that were controlled by France, Britain, and the United States were combined to form West Germany. West Germany was bordered on the east by the Soviet controlled East Germany. The Allies also controlled the western part of Berlin, a city tucked deep inside communist East Germany. West Berlin was, as one Soviet leader later described it, “a bone in the throat” of the Soviet Union. Its relative prosperity and freedom stood in contrast to the bleak life of East Berliners. Stalin was determined to capture West Berlin or win other concessions from the Western allies. In June 1948, he stopped all highway, railway, and waterway traffic from western Germany into West Berlin. Without any means of receiving aid, West Berlin would fall to the communists. Stalin was able to close roads, stop barges, and block railways, but he could not blockade the sky. For almost a year, the United States and Britain supplied West Berlin, through a massive airlift. Everything the residents of West Berlin needed was flown into the city. Even through rain and snow, goods arrived regularly. The Berlin airlift demonstrated to West Berlin, the Soviet Union, and the world how far the United States would go to protest noncommunist parts of Europe and contain communism.

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) / Warsaw Pact
NATO – (1949) Military alliance of 12 Democratic Western European and North American nations which agreed to defend Western Europe from Soviet expansion. Warsaw Pact – (1955) Military alliance of the Soviet Union and its satellite states which pledged to defend one another if attacked. In May 1949, Stalin was forced to acknowledge that his attempt to blockade Berlin had failed. The Berlin airlift was a proud moment for Americans and Berliners and a major success for the policy of containment. One Berlin resident later recalled her feelings when the blockade was finally lifted: “Sheer joy – nothing else. Nothing else. Joy, and the feeling that “We have done it! And it works!... That was so very important. The West has won! I say this quite deliberately in such a crass way because you wanted to know how I felt emotionally. The West 0 well, we have succeeded. And the West has won and the others have not!” –Ella Barowsky, CNN Interview, 1996 The Berlin airlift demonstrated that Stalin could be contained if Western nations were prepared to take forceful action. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, formed in 1949, provided the military alliance to counter Soviet expansion. Member nations agreed that “an armed attack against one or more of them… shall be considered an attack against all of them.” This principle of mutual military assistance is called collective security. In 1955, West Germany became a member of NATO. In response, the Soviet Union and its satellite states formed a rival military alliance, called the Warsaw Pact. All the communist states of Eastern Europe, except Yugoslavia, were members. Like members of NATO, nations of the Warsaw Pact pledged to defend one another if attacked. Although members agreed on paper not to interfere in one another’s internal affairs, the Soviet Union continued to exert firm control over its Warsaw Pact allies.

Brinkmanship John Foster Dulles served as Secretary of State under President Eisenhower during the 1950s. Dulles helped organize the United Nations after WWII and, as the nation’s chief diplomat, supported stockpiling nuclear weapons to prevent endless U.S. involvement in minor conflicts, such as the Korean War. Brinkmanship was Dulles’ approach to diplomacy with the U.S.S.R., going to the brink of war in order to protect allies, discourage communist aggression, and prevent war. President Dwight Eisenhower knew firsthand the horrors of war and the need to defend democracy. He had led the World War II Allied invasions of North Africa, Italy, and Normandy. Having worked with top military and political leaders during the war, he was capable of speaking the language of both. Eisenhower accepted much of Truman’s foreign policy. He believed strongly in a policy to actively contain communism. In the approach of Dulles and Eisenhower toward foreign policy, they differed significantly from Truman and his Secretary of State, Dean Acheson. Both teams of men considered the spread of communism the greatest threat to the free world. But Eisenhower believed that Truman’s approach to foreign policy had dragged the United States into an endless series of conflicts begun by the Soviet Union. These limited, regional conflicts threatened to drain the country’s resources. Closure Question #3: Do you think that the massive retaliation policy favored by John Foster Dulles successfully deterred the Soviet Union? Explain your answer in at least 1 sentence.

Closure Assignment #6 Answer the following questions based on what you have learned from Chapter 33, Section 1: In your opinion, why did the United States assume global responsibility for containing communism? (At least 1 sentence) How did World War II affect the world balance of power? Which nations emerged from the conflict as world powers? (At least 2 sentences) Do you think that the massive retaliation policy favored by John Foster Dulles successfully deterred the Soviet Union? Explain your answer in at least 1 sentence.

Jiang Jieshi / Taiwan/ Mao Zedong
Jiang Jieshi – (AKA Chiang Kai-Shek) Nationalist leader of China who, though supported by the U.S., was defeated in the Chinese Civil War and forced to flee to Taiwan in 1949. Mao Zedong – Chinese communist who, after nearly 20 years of war, succeeded in establishing the People’s Republic of China in 1949, a communist nation allied with the Soviet Union. Before Japan invaded China in 1937, Nationalist leader Jiang Jieshi, known in the United States as Chiang Kai-Shek, had been fighting a civil war against communists led by Mao Zedong. Although Jiang and Mao temporarily joined forces in an uneasy alliance to fight Japan, the civil war resumed with a new fury after the war ended. The Soviet Union supported Mao, while the United States sent several billion dollars in aid to Jiang. American leaders feared that Jiang’s defeat would create a communist superpower spanning most of Asia. Europe had been the first focus of the Cold War. But in the early 1950s, U.S. involvement in the Korean War made East Asia the prime battleground in the long, hard Cold War struggle. The division between North and South Korea remains a source of international tension today. Since the time of the Russian Revolution, the Soviets had hoped to spread communism to every corner of the world, training foreigners in Marxist theory and revolutionary strategy. The Soviets were confident that communism would reach worldwide influnce. Mao’s victory was an immense shock to Americans. Not only was China under the control of sworn enemies of the United States, but communist regimes controlled about one fourth of the world’s landmass and one third of its population. “Who lost China?” Americans asked. Many critics blamed the Truman administration, saying that the United States had failed to give enough support to Jiang. Closure Question #1: Why did the United States support the Nationalists in the civil war in China?

Commune In 1958 Mao presented a program, known as the Great Leap Forward, to speed up economic growth in China. This program combined over 700,000 existing, village-sized farms into 26,000 communes (vast community farms). It proved to be an economic disaster, as bad weather combined with peasants’ hatred for the system drove food production down, causing 15 million people to die of starvation. To speed up economic growth, Mao began a more radical program, known as the Great Leap Forward, in Under this program, over 700,000 existing collective farms, normally the size of a village, were combined into 26,000 vast communes. Each commune contained more than 30,000 people who lived and worked together. Since they had communal child care, more than 500,000 Chinese mothers worked beside their husbands in the fields by 1958. Mao hoped his Great Leap Forward program would enable China to reach the final stage of communism – the classless society – before the end of the 20th century. The government’s official slogan promised the following to the Chinese people: “Hard work for a few years, happiness for a thousand.” Despite such slogans, the Great Leap Forward was an economic disaster. Bad weather, which resulted in droughts and floods, and the peasants’ hatred of the new system drove food production down. As a result, nearly 15 million people died of starvation. In 1960 the government began to break up the communes and return to collective farms and some private plots. Closure Question #2: Explain how the Cold War affected relations between China and the United States. (At least 1 sentence)

Red Guards Revolutionary groups composed of young people who were assigned to eliminate the “four olds” – old ideas, old culture, old customs, and old habits. The Red Guards destroyed any object they found connected to ancient Chinese culture and arrested anyone who opposed Mao’s plans for Chinese communism. Despite opposition within the Communist Party and the commune failure. Mao still dreamed of a classless society. In Mao’s eyes, only permanent revolution could enable the Chinese to achieve the final stage of communism. In 1966 Mao launched the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. The Chinese name literally meant “great revolution to create a proletarian (working class) culture.” A collection of Mao’s thoughts, called the Little Red Book, became a sort of bible for the Chinese Communists. It was hailed as the most important source of knowledge in all areas. The book was in every hotel, in every school, and in factories, communes, and universities. Few people conversed without first referring to the Little Red Book. To further the Cultural Revolution, the Red Guards were formed. These were revolutionary groups composed largely of young people. Red Guards set out across the nation to eliminate the “Four Olds” – old ideas, old culture, old customs, and old habits. The Red Guard destroyed temples, books written by foreigners, and foreign music. They tore down street signs and replaced them with ones carrying revolutionary names. The city of Shanghai even ordered that red (the revolutionary color) traffic lights would indicate that traffic could move, not stop. Vicious attacks were made on individuals who had supposedly deviated from Mao’s plan. Intellectuals and artists accused of being pro-Western were especially open to attack. One such person, Nien Cheng, worked for the British-owned Shell Oil Company in Shanghai. She was imprisoned for seven years. She told of her experience in Life and Death in Shanghai.

Cultural Revolution “Great revolution to create a proletarian (working class) culture.”; In 1966 Mao launched the revolution to encourage love for the new system of communism and to eliminate the “old” traditions of China. The Red Guards executed or imprisoned thousands of intellectuals, artists, and other who were viewed as being anti-Communist, causing chaos in Chinese society. As a result, agricultural and industrial production decreased leading to fears of starvation and another civil war. By 1968, Mao himself admitted that the revolution needed to stop and ordered the army to put down the Red Guards. Key groups, including Communist Party members and many military officers, did not share Mao’s desire for permanent revolution. People, disgusted by the actions of the Red Guards, began to turn against the movement. In September 1976, Mao Zedong died at the age of 82. A group of practical minded reformers led by Deng Zioping seized power and brought the Cultural Revolution to an end. Deng Xiaoping called for Four Modernizations – new policies in industry, agriculture, technology, and national defense. For over 20 years, China had been isolated from the technological advances taking place elsewhere in the world. To make up for lost time, the government invited foreign investors to China. The government also sent thousands of students abroad to study science, technology, and modern business techniques. A new agricultural policy was begun. Collective farms could now lease land to peasant families who paid rent to the collective. Anything produced on the land above the amount of that payment could be sold on the private market. Peasants were allowed to make goods they could sell to others. Closure Question #3: Why did the Cultural Revolution fail? (At least 1 sentence)

Closure Assignment #7 Answer the following questions based on what you have learned from Chapter 33, Section 2: Why did the United States support the Nationalists in the civil war in China? Explain how the Cold War affected relations between China and the United States. (At least 1 sentence) Why did the Cultural Revolution fail? (At least 1 sentence)

38th Parallel Latitude at which was set the dividing line between North and South Korea after World War II by the U.S.A. and U.S.S.R. The line still forms the border between the two independent nations today. The focus of attention turned to the peninsula of Korea, separated from northeast China by the Yalu River. Once controlled by Japan, Korea had been divided into two independent countries by the United States and the Soviet Union after World War II. In North Korea, the Soviets installed a communist government and equipped its armed forces. The United States provided smaller amounts of aid to noncommunist South Korea. American occupation troops remained in South Korea until June Their departure coincided with the communist victory in China. Soon after, North Korea began a major military buildup. On June 25, 1950, North Korean forces attacked across the 38th parallel. The 90,000 North Korean troops were armed with powerful tanks and other Soviet weapons. Within days, the northerners overtook the South Korean capital city of Seoul and set out after the retreating South Korean army. President Truman remembered how the policy of appeasement had failed to check the German aggression that sparked World War II. Determined that history would not repeat itself, he announced that the United States would aid South Korea. Within days, the UN Security Council unanimously voted to follow Truman’s lead, recommending that “the Members of the United Nations furnish such assistance to the Republic of Korea as may be necessary to repel the armed attack and to restore international peace and security in the area.” Undoubtedly, the Soviet Union would have used its veto power to block the UN resolution if it had been present for the vote. However, it had been boycotting Security Council sessions because the UN had refused to seat Mao’s People’s Republic of China.

Douglas MacArthur General who led American troops in the Korean War. From September to November 1950 MacArthur’s forces succeeded in pushing North Korean troops to the Yulu River, its border with China, but then were pushed back to the 38th parallel by the Chinese army in January 1951. By September 1950, the UN forces were ready to counterattack. General MacArthur, the World War II hero, had a bold plan to drive the invaders from South Korea. He suspected that the rapid advance of North Korean troops had left North Korea with limited supply lines. He decided to strike at this weakness by launching a surprise attack on the port city of Inchon, well behind enemy lines. Because Inchon was such a poor landing site, with swift currents and treacherous tides, MacArthur knew that the enemy would not expect an attack there. MacArthur’s bold gamble paid off handsomely. On the morning of September 15, 1950, U.S. Marines landed at Inchon and launched an attack into the rear guard of the North Koreans. Communist forces began fleeing for the North Korean border. By October 1950, the North Koreans had been driven north of the 38th parallel. With the retreat of North Korean forces, U.S. officials had to decide what to do next. Should they declare their UN mandate accomplished and end the war? Or should they send their forces north of the 38th parallel and punish the communists for the invasion? Truman was concerned about the action China would take if the United States carried the war into North Korea. Chinese leaders publicly warned the Americans not to advance near its borders. But MacArthur did not take this warning seriously. He assured Truman that China would not intervene in the war. Based on this advice, the United States pushed a resolution through the UN, calling for a “unified, independent, and democratic” Korea. Closure Question #1: How did General MacArthur’s decision to advance toward the Yalu River change the course of the Korean War? (At least 1 sentence)

Ho Chi Minh Leader of the Communist Party in Vietnam; Minh led his followers to overthrow French colonial rule in North Vietnam in1954, then continued the fight against democratic South Vietnam, and its allies from the United States, until 1975. Dien Bien Phu was a French military base in northwest Vietnam in which Ho Chi Minh’s army, known as the Vietminh, trapped a large French garrison in After suffering 15,000 casualties, the French surrendered. At a peace conference in Geneva in 1955 the Vietnamese agreed that their country would be divided in two: North Vietnam was to be ruled by Ho Chi Minh’s communists; South Vietnam, by an anti-communist government supported by the United States. During WWII, Japan had undermined French control over Vietnam. But when the conflict ended, France reasserted its colonial aims there. France’s problem, however, was that colonialism was a dying institution. World War II had strengthened nationalist movements while weakening the economic and military positions of traditional European powers. In Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh clamored for independence as France struggled to maintain its dwindling global power. Meanwhile, the United States faced a difficult decision. On the one hand, it supported decolonialization. On the other hand, America wanted France as an ally in its Cold War effort to contain the Soviet Union. President Harry S. Truman believed that if he supported Vietnamese independence, he would weaken anticommunist forces in France. So, to ensure a strong, anticommunist Western Europe, Truman sacrificed his own anticolonial sentiments.

Domino Theory Belief that if Communism were allowed to spread into one country, it would then spread to many other countries; The United States fought against Communists in Vietnam from 1964 to 1973 in attempt to keep Communism out of Southeast Asia but failed to do so. By 1963, the United States had been drawn into a new struggle that had an important impact on the Cold War – the Vietnam War. In 1964, under President Lyndon B. Johnson, increasing numbers of U.S. troops were sent to Vietnam. Their purpose was to keep the Communist regime of North Vietnam from invading and gaining control of South Vietnam. U.S. policy makers saw the conflict in terms of a domino theory. If the Communists succeeded in South Vietnam, the argument went, other countries in Asia would also fall (like dominoes) to communism. Despite the success of the North Vietnamese Communists, the domino theory proved unfounded. A split between Communist China and the Soviet Union put an end to the Western idea that there was a single form of communism directed by Moscow. Under President Nixon, American relations with China were resumed. New nations in Southeast Asia managed to avoid Communist governments. Above all, Vietnam helped show the limitations of American power. By the end of the Vietnam War, a new era in American-Soviet relations had begun to emerge.

Ngo Dinh Diem Dictator of the anti-Communist South Vietnamese government supported by the United States. Many Vietnamese supported the communists due to their anger with Diem’s actions. In 1963, a group of South Vietnamese generals had Diem assassinated, but the new leaders of South Vietnam were no more popular than Diem had been. After his election in 1960, President John F. Kennedy took a more aggressive stand against the communists in Vietnam. Beginning in 1961, he sent Special Forces troops to South Vietnam to advise the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) on more effective ways to fight the communist forces. By 1963, more than 15,000 American “advisers” were fighting in Vietnam. Although U.S. advisers fought bravely and achieved some success, Diem continued to alienate South Vietnamese citizens. By late 1963, his regime was in shambles. Buddhists protested his restrictive policies, occasionally by setting themselves on fire. The Kennedy administration eventually concluded that South Vietnam needed new leadership. Working behind the scenes, Americans plotted with anti-Diem generals to overthrow Diem’s government. On November 1, 1963, Diem was removed from power and later assassinated. Three weeks after Diem’s fall, an assassin’s bullet struck down President Kennedy. Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson was sworn in as the new President. Johnson was a Cold War traditionalist who held a monolithic view of communism. For this “Cold Warrior,” communism in the Soviet Union, China, and Vietnam were all the same. He did not recognize subtle differences. He also knew that the American people expected victory in Vietnam. In 1964, President Johnson faced his first crisis in Vietnam. On August 2, North Vietnamese torpedo boats fired on the American destroyer USS Maddox as it patrolled the Gulf of Tonkin off the coast of North Vietnam. The Maddox was not hit, and it returned fire on the North Vietnamese boat. Johnson promptly responded to the attack and to other North Vietnamese provocations. He announced that “aggression by terror against peaceful villages of South Vietnam has now been joined by open aggression on the high seas against an American ally, Johnson ordered an airstrike against North Vietnam.

Vietcong Vietcong – Communist guerrilla fighters within South Vietnam that wanted to unite Vietnam under a communist government. The Vietcong used surprise hit-and-run tactics to assassinate government officials and destroy roads and bridges, weakening support of the anti-communist government led by Ngo Dinh Diem. During the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, France appealed to the United States for military support. President Eisenhower was willing to supply money but not soldiers. Ike would not commit American troops to defend colonialism in Asia. Nevertheless, the President firmly supported the new anticommunist government of South Vietnam. America channeled aid to South Vietnam in different ways. In 1954, the United States and seven other countries formed SEATO. Similar to NATO, SEATO’s goal was to contain the spread of communism in Southeast Asia. The United States provided economic and military aid to the South Vietnamese government led by Ngo Dinh Diem. Diem was an ardent nationalist and anticommunist. Although he lacked popular appeal, his anticommunism guaranteed American support. When it came time for the 1956 unification elections, American intelligence analysts predicted that Diem refused to participate in the elections, a move made under the auspices of the United States government. By 1957, a communist rebel group in the South, known as the National Liberation Front (NLF), had committed themselves to undermining the Diem government and uniting Vietnam under a communist flag. NLF guerrilla fighters, called Vietcong, launched an insurgency in which they assassinated government officials and destroyed roads and bridges. Supplied by communists in North Vietnam, the Vietcong employed surprise hit-and-run tactics to weaken Diem’s hold on South Vietnam. Diem’s own policies also weakened his position in South Vietnam. A devout Roman Catholic in an overwhelmingly Buddhist nation, Diem did little to build a broad political base. Instead, he signed anti-Buddhist legislation and refused to enact significant land reforms.

Closure Question #2: Explain how television coverage affected the Vietnam War. (At least 1 sentence)
Despite the massive superiority in equipment and firepower of the American forces, the United States failed to defeat the North Vietnamese. The growing number of American troops in Vietnam soon produced an antiwar movement in the United States, especially among college students of draft age. The mounting destruction of the conflict, seen on television, also turned American public opinion against the war. President Johnson, condemned for his handling of the costly and indecisive war, decided not to run for reelection. Former vice president Richard M. Nixon won the election with his pledge to stop the war and bring the American people together. Ending the war was difficult, and Nixon’s administration was besieged by antiwar forces. Finally, in 1973, President Nixon reached an agreement with North Vietnam that allowed the United States to withdraw its forces. Within two years after the American withdrawal, Vietnam had been forcibly reunited by Communist armies from the North.

Vietnamization Policy for withdrawal from Vietnam presented by President Nixon; U.S. forces would withdraw as the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) assumed more combat duties. Though the hope of the policy was that the ARVN would be able to secure South Vietnam with aid from the U.S. behind the front lines, the reality was that the ARVN troops were outnumbered and outgunned without U.S. combat troops. Nixon’s defenders argued that he was a hard-working patriot with a new vision for America. His critics charged that he was a deceitful politician bent on acquiring power and punishing his enemies. There were elements of truth to both views. But defenders and critics alike agreed that Richard Nixon was a determined man with abundant political talent. From his first day in office, the new President realized that ending the Vietnam War was the key to everything else he hoped to achieve. Though formal peace talks between the warring parties had begun in May 1968, they were bogged down from the outset by disagreements and a lack of compromise . When Richard Nixon took office in January 1969, his peace delegation firmly believed they could break the impasse. The Americans and South Vietnamese wanted all communist troops out of South Vietnam. They also wanted prisoners of war (POWs) returned. Meanwhile, the North Vietnamese demanded an immediate American withdrawal from Vietnam and the formation of a coalition government in South Vietnam that would include representatives from the Vietcong. Still hoping to win the war in the field, North Vietnam refused to budge from its initial position. And South Vietnam refused to sign any agreement that compromised its security. President Nixon refused to accept the North Vietnamese peace terms. He was committed to a policy of “peace with honor” and believed that there were still military options. He continued a gradual pullout of American troops, and expressed faith in the ability of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam to assume the burden of war. To reduce the flow of communist supplies to the Vietcong, Nixon ordered the secret bombing of the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Cambodia. This was a controversial move because it widened the scope of the war and helped to undermine the neutral government in Cambodia.

Khmer Rouge The Southeast Asian country of Cambodia, like Vietnam, was part of French Indochina and ruled by the French. In 1975, Cambodia claimed its independence and established a communist government known as the Khmer Rouge under the leadership of Pol Pot. The Khmer Rouge carried out a massacre of two million Cambodians who were accused of not supporting communism. The reunification of Vietnam under Communist rule had an immediate impact on the region. By the end of 1975, both Laos and Cambodia had communist governments. In Cambodia, Pol Pot, leader of the Khmer Rouge, massacred more than a million Cambodians. However, the Communist triumph in Indochina did not lead to the “falling dominoes” that many U.S. policy makers had feared. At first, many new leaders in Southeast Asia hoped to set up democratic states. By the end of the 1950s, however, hopes for rapid economic growth had failed. This failure and internal disputes led to military or one-party regimes. In recent years, some Southeast Asian societies have once against moved toward democracy. However, serious obstacles remain for these peoples. The Vietnamese invaded Cambodia in They overthrew the Khmer Rouge and installed a less repressive government. But fighting continued. The Vietnamese withdrew in In 1993, under the supervision of UN peacekeepers, Cambodia adopted a democratic constitution and held free elections. Closure Question #3: Why do you think that the United Nations and the United States did not take military action to prevent the communist takeover of Cambodia and the genocide that followed?

Closure Assignment #8 Answer the following questions based on what you have learned from Chapter 33, Section 3: How did General MacArthur’s decision to advance toward the Yalu River change the course of the Korean War? (At least 1 sentence) Explain how television coverage affected the Vietnam War. (At least 1 sentence) Why do you think that the United Nations and the United States did not take military action to prevent the communist takeover of Cambodia and the genocide that followed?

Third World Developing nations, many of which were newly independent, who were not aligned with either the United States or the Soviet Union during the Cold War. These countries became locations for competition between the United States and the Soviet Union. Following WWII, the world’s nations were grouped politically into three “worlds”. The first was the industrialized capitalist nations, including the United States and its allies. The second was the Communist nations led by the Soviet Union. The Third World nations were located in Latin America, Asia, and Africa. They were economically poor and politically unstable. This was largely due to a long history of colonialism. They also suffered from ethnic conflicts and lack of technology and education. Each needed a political and economic system around which to build its society. Soviet-style communism and U.S.-style free-market democracy were the main choices. The United States has long played a major role in Latin America. Business investment by U.S. companies was one of the reasons the United States often intervened in Latin American affairs. U.S. investors would often pressure the U.S. government to prevent social and political change in Latin America – even if that meant backing dictators. For years, the United States had sent troops into Latin American countries to protect U.S. interests. Then in the 1930s, President Franklin D. Roosevelt began a Good Neighbor policy, an effort to end such intervention. In 1948, the states of the Western Hemisphere formed the Organization of American States (OAS). The OAS emphasized the need for Latin American independence. It passed a resolution calling for an end to military action by one state in the affairs of another. The formation of the OAS however, did not end U.S. involvement in Latin American affairs.

Nonaligned Nations Countries which hoped to avoid involvement in the Cold War by refusing to ally themselves with the Soviet Union or the United States. In 1955 a group of the leaders of third-world nations in Africa and Asia met at the Bandung Conference in Indonesia to form what they called a “third force” of independent countries. Some nations, such as India and Indonesia, were able to maintain their neutrality. Bt others took sides with the superpowers or played competing sides against each other. After World War II, most states in Southeast Asia gained independence from their colonial rulers. The Philippines became independent of the United States in Great Britain also ended its colonial rule in Southeast Asia. In 1948, Burma became independent. Malaya’s turn came in France refused, however, to let go of Indochina. This led to a long war in Vietnam. In Southeast Asia, the Netherlands was unwilling to give up its colonies and tried to suppress the Indonesian republic proclaimed by Sukarno. When the Indonesian Communist Party attempted to seize power, the United States pressured the Netherlands to grant independence to Sukarno and his non-Communist Nationalist Party. In 1949 the Netherlands recognized the new Republic of Indonesia. As British rule ended in India, India’s Muslims and Hindus were bitterly divided. India’s leaders decided to create two countries, one Hindu (India) and one Muslim (Pakistan). Pakistan would have two regions: West Pakistan and East Pakistan. When India and Pakistan became independent on August 15, 1947, Hindus moved toward India; Muslims, toward Pakistan. More than one million people were killed in the mass migrations. One of the dead was well known. On January 30, 1948, a Hindu militant assassinated Mohandas Gandhi as he was going to morning prayer.

Fidel Castro The Cuban Revolution ( ) was a popular uprising which led by Fidel Castro to overthrow the U.S. supported, dictatorial government of Cuba and to establish a communist government. As a young law student in Havana, Castro came to resent the dictatorial government of Fulgencio Batista which was supported by the United States. Angered by the social inequality which left the majority of Cubans in uneducated and impoverished, Castro became a revolutionary. After leading a failed attack on a Cuban military base in 1953, Castro fled to Mexico where he organized a stronger revolutionary force. In 1958 Castro returned to Cuba and gained popular support, finally seizing Havana in 1959. In the 1950s, an opposition movement arose in Cuba. It aimed to overthrow the government of the dictator Fulgencio Batista, who had controlled Cuba since The leader of the movement was a man named Fidel Castro. While a law student at the University of Havana, he had become a revolutionary. On July 26, 1953, Castro and his brother Raul led a band of 165 young people in an attack on the Moncada army camp at Santiago de Cuba. The attack was a disaster. While Fidel and Raul escaped, they were later captured and sentenced to prison for 15 years. Batista released Fidel and Raul after 11 months. After their release, the Castro brothers fled to the Sierra Maestra mountains in Mexico. There they teamed up with a small band of revolutionaries. Castro poured out a stream of propaganda with a small radio station and printing press. As the rebels gained more support, the Batista regime collapsed. Castro’s revolutionaries seized Havana on January 3, Many Cubans who disagreed with Castro fled to the United States. Relations between Cuba and the United States quickly deteriorated when Castro’s Communist regime began to receive aid from the Soviet Union. Arms from Eastern Europe also began to arrive in Cuba. In October 1960, the United States declared a trade embargo. Just three months later all diplomatic relations with Cuba were broken. Soon after that, in April 1961, U.S. President John F. Kennedy supported an attempt to overthrow Castro’s government. When the invasion at the Bay of Pigs failed the Soviets made an even greater commitment to Cuba. In December, 1961, Castro declared himself a Marxist, drawing even closer to the Soviet Union. The Soviets began placing nuclear missiles in Cuba in 1962, leading to a showdown with the United States.

Closure Question #1: How did the Cold War confrontations affect the decision of the United States to move against Fidel Castro in Cuba? What was the outcome of that decision? (At least 2 sentences) During the administration of John F. Kennedy, the Cold War confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union reached frightening levels. In 1959 a left-wing revolutionary named Fidel Castro overthrew the Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista and set up a Soviet-supported totalitarian regime in Cuba. Having a socialist regime with Communist contacts so close to the mainland was considered a threat to the security of the United States. President Kennedy feared that if he moved openly against Castro, then the Soviets might retaliate by moving against Berlin. As a result, the stage might be set for the two superpowers to engage in a nuclear war. For months, Kennedy had considered alternatives. He finally approved a plan that the CIA had proposed. Exiled Cuban fighters would invade Cuba at the Bay of Pigs, on the Playa Giron and Playa Larga beaches. The purpose of the invasion was to cause a revolt against Castro. The invasion was a disaster. It began on Sunday, April 16, By Wednesday, the exiled fighters began surrendering. One hundred fourteen died; the rest were captured by Castro’s troops. After the Bay of Pigs, the Soviet Union sent advisers to Cuba. Then, in 1962, Khrushchev began to place nuclear missiles in Cuba. The missiles were meant to counteract U.S. nuclear weapons in Turkey, a country within easy range of the Soviet Union. Khrushchev said: “Your rockets are in Turkey. You are worried by Cuba… because it is 90 miles from the American coast. But Turkey is next to us.” The United States was not willing to allow nuclear weapons within such close striking distance of its mainland. In October 1962, Kennedy found out that Soviet ships carrying missiles were heading to Cuba. He decided to blockade Cuba to prevent the fleet from reaching its destination. This approach gave each side time to find a peaceful solution. Khrushchev agreed to turn back the fleet and remove Soviet missiles from Cuba if Kennedy pledged not to invade Cuba. Kennedy quickly agreed.

Cuban Missile Crisis (October 1962) U.S. intelligence discovered that the Soviets were building nuclear missiles sites in Cuba, threatening major East Coast cities. Kennedy demanded the removal of the missiles, and approved a naval blockade of Cuba to prevent the Soviets from completing the bases. Behind the scenes, Kennedy promised to remove U.S. missiles in Turkey and Italy. After 6 tense days, the Soviets agreed to the compromise. After breaking diplomatic relations with Cuba in 1961, the Eisenhower administration authorized the Central Intelligence Agency to plan an invasion of Cuba to overthrow Castro. The CIA recruited Cuban exiles and trained them in Guatemala. But when Eisenhower left office, the invasion plan was still that – an unexecuted, untried plan. Pressured by members of the CIA and his own aides, Kennedy decided to implement the plan. On April 17, 1961, a CIA-led force of Cuban exiles attacked Cuba. The invasion was badly mismanaged. The poorly equipped forces landed at the site with no protective cover. Not only did the Bay of Pigs invasion fail, it probably strengthened Castro’s position in Cuba. Closure Question #2: Which of the 3 political leaders involved in the Cuban Missile Crisis should receive the most blame for what very nearly was a nuclear holocaust? Explain your answer. 78

Anastasio Somoza In Nicaragua, the Somoza family seized control of the government in 1937 and maintained control for the next 45 years. It began with Anastasio Somoza Garcia’s introduction as president, followed by his two sons. Over most of this period, the Somoza regime had the support of the United States. The Somozas enriched themselves at the expense of the Nicaraguan people and used murder and torture to silence opposition. After World War II, the wealthy elite and the military controlled the government in El Salvador. The rise of an urban middle class led to hope for a more democratic government. The army, however, refused to accept the results of free elections that were held in World attention focused on El Salvador in the late 1970s and the 1980s, when the country was rocked by a bitter civil war. Marxist-led, leftist guerrillas and right-wing groups battled one another. The Catholic Church became a main target, and a number of priests were killed or tortured, among them Archbishop Oscar Romero. Death squads killed anyone they thought a threat to their interests. When U.S. president Ronald Reagan claimed evidence of “communist interference in El Salvador,” the United States began to provide weapons and training to the Salvadoran army to defeat the guerrillas. The hope was to bring stability to the country, but the killings continued. In 1984, a moderate, Jose Duarte, was elected president. The unrest in El Salvador cut short Duarte’s efforts at political, social, and economic reforms. Nor could Duarte stop the savage killing. By the early 1990s, at least 75,000 people were dead. A 1992 peace settlement ended the war. Duarte did not live to see his hope for peace fulfilled. After transferring power to his successor, Duarte said that his government had “laid the foundation for democracy in this country.” Duarte died in 1990.

Daniel Ortega Leader of Marxist guerrilla forces in Nicaragua known as the Sandinista National Liberation Front. In 1979, the Sandinistas won a number of military victories against Somoza’s government forces and gained control of the country. Soon, a group opposed to the Sandinistas’ polices, called the contras, began to try to overthrow the new government. Worried by the Sandinistas’ alignment with the Soviet Union, the United States supported the contras. The war waged by the contras undermined support for the Sandinistas. In 1990, the Sandinistas, led by Daniel Ortega, agreed to free elections and lost to a coalition headed by Violeta Barrios de Chamorro, who became Nicaragua’s first female president. After 16 years out of power, the Sandinistas won new elections in 2006 and Daniel Ortega became president in January 2007. A wealthy oligarchy ruled Panama with U.S. support. After 1968, military leaders of Panama’s National Guard were in control. One of these, Manuel Noriega, became so involved in the drug trade that President George H. W. Bush sent U.S. troops to Panama in Noriega was later sent to prison in the United States for drug trafficking. A major issue for Panamanians was finally settled in 1999 when Panama took control of the Panama Canal. The terms for this change of control had been set in a 1977 treaty with the United States.

Ayatollah Ruholla Khomeini
Fundamentalist Islamic Clerk who, in 1979, led a revolt to overthrow the Shah (Emperor) of Iran who had been supported by the United States. The Khomeini government held the U.S. Embassy and the 52 Americans inside hostage for over a year. President Carter’s inability to free the hostages combined with continuing economic problems turned American public opinion against him. President Jimmy Carter hoped that the Camp David Accords would usher in a new era of cooperation in the Middle East. Yet, events in Iran showed that troubles in the region were far from over. Since the 1950s, the United States had supported the rule of the Shah, or emperor, of Iran. In the 1970s, however, opposition to the Shah began to grow within Iran. Dying of cancer, the Shah fled from Iran in January Fundamentalist Islamic clerics took power. Carter allowed the Shah to enter the United States to seek medical treatment. Enraged Iranian radical students invaded the U.S. Embassy and took 66 Americans as hostages. The Khomeini government then took control of both the embassy and the hostages to defy the United States. The hostage crisis consumed the attention of Carter during the last year of his presidency. To many Americans, Carter’s failure to win all of the hostages’ release was evidence of American weakness. As Peter Bourne put it in his biography of Jimmy Carter, “Because people felt that Carter had not been tough enough in foreign policy… some bunch of students could seize American diplomatic officials and hold them prisoner and thumb their nose at the United States.” Closure Question #3: What similarities do you see among U.S. actions in Nicaragua, Cuba, and Iran? (Give at least 2 similarities in 2 complete sentences)

Closure Assignment #9 Answer the following questions based on what you have learned from Chapter 33, Section 4: How did the Cold War confrontations affect the decision of the United States to move against Fidel Castro in Cuba? What was the outcome of that decision? (At least 2 sentences) Which of the 3 political leaders involved in the Cuban Missile Crisis should receive the most blame for what very nearly was a nuclear holocaust? Explain your answer. What similarities do you see among U.S. actions in Nicaragua, Cuba, and Iran? (Give at least 2 similarities in 2 complete sentences)

Nikita Khrushchev New leader of the Soviet Union following the death of Joseph Stalin in 1953; Khrushchev was a communist and a determined opponent of the U.S.A., but he was not as suspicious or cruel as Stalin. In Khrushchev met with President Eisenhower in Geneva, giving both the Soviet Union and the United States hope that the two powers could peacefully co-exist. Khrushchev realized the need to stop the flow of refugees from East Germany through West Berlin. In August 1961, the East German government began to build a wall separating West Berlin from East Berlin. Eventually it became a massive barrier guarded by barbed wire, flood-lights, machine-gun towers, minefields, and vicious dog patrols. The Berlin Wall became a striking symbol of the division between the two superpowers. The Cuban missile crisis seemed to bring the world frighteningly close to nuclear war. Indeed, in 1992 a high- ranking Soviet officer revealed that short-range rockets armed with nuclear devices would have been used against U.S. troops if the United States had invaded Cuba, an option that Kennedy fortunately had rejected. The realization that the world might have been destroyed in a few days had a profound influence on both sides. A hotline communications system between Moscow and Washington D.C., was installed in The two superpowers could now communicate quickly in times of crisis.

Sputnik The first man-made satellite; The Soviet Union launched Sputnik into orbit in October of 1957, sparking a space-race between the United States and U.S.S.R., with each side trying to stay ahead of the other in space exploration. Yuri Gagarin was the first human to orbit the earth; On April 12th, 1961 Gagarin was launched into orbit aboard the Vostok 3KA-3. After the flight Gagarin became an international celebrity, touring throughout Europe to promote the Soviet achievement. The Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the first successful artificial space satellite, on October 4, as it circled the earth every 96 minutes, Premier Nikita Khrushchev boated that his country would soon be “turning out long-range missiles like sausages.” The United States accelerated its space program. After early failures, a U.S. satellite was launched in 1958. Beginning in the late 1950s, the United States and the Soviet Union competed for influence not only among the nations of the world, but in the skies as well. Once the superpowers had ICBMs (intercontinental ballistic missiles) to deliver nuclear warheads and aircraft for spying missions, they both began to develop technology that could be used to explore – and ultimately control – space. However, after nearly two decades of costly competition, the two superpowers began to cooperate in space exploration. Closure Question #1: Why was achieving victory in the Space Race viewed as being essential by both the Soviet Union and the United States?

Leonid Brezhnev Leader of the Soviet Union during the late 1960s and 1970s; Brezhnev was determined to keep Eastern Europe in Soviet control and continue the arms race with the United States by focusing the Soviet economy on heavy industry. However, under his leadership the Soviet ruling class (government and military leaders) became increasingly corrupt and complacent. Between 1964 and 1982, drastic change in the Soviet Union had seemed highly unlikely. What happened to create such a dramatic turnaround in the late 1980s? Alexei Kosygin and Leonid Brezhnev replaced Nikita Khrushchev when he was removed from office in Brezhnev emerged as the dominant leader in the 1970s. Determined to keep Eastern Europe in Communist hands, he was not interested in reform. He also insisted on the Soviet Union’s right to intervene if communism was threatened in another Communist state. At the same time, Brezhnev benefited from détente. Roughly equal to the United States in nuclear arms, the Soviet Union felt more secure. As a result its leaders relaxed their authoritarian rule. Brezhnev allowed more access to Western styles of music, dress, and art. In his economic policies, Brezhnev continued to emphasize heavy industry. Two problems, however, weakened the Soviet economy. First, the central government was a huge, complex, but inefficient bureaucracy that led to indifference. Second, many collective farmers preferred working their own small private plots to laboring in the collective work brigades. By the 1970s, the Communist ruling class in the Soviet Union had become complacent and corrupt. Party and state leaders, as well as army leaders and secret police (KGB), enjoyed a high standard of living. Regardless of the government’s inefficiency and corruption, Brezhnev did not want to tamper with the party leadership and state bureaucracy. Closure Question #2: According to the Brezhnev Doctrine, the Soviet Union should have used military force in Vietnam to aid the Vietcong. Why do you think they did not do so?

John F. Kennedy U.S. President from 1961 to 1963; A Democrat, JFK was the youngest President ever elected. A Harvard graduate from a prominent New England family (His father was US Ambassador to England during WWII), Kennedy won over the American people with his energy, charming personality, and model family, despite being a Catholic. Flexible Response was JFK’s military policy, which emphasized the importance of preparing the United States to fight any type of conflict. During the Kennedy administration, government funding for all military corps increased. As the first President born in the 20th century, Kennedy proclaimed that a “new generation of Americans” was ready to meet any challenge. In his Inaugural Address, Kennedy warned his country’s enemies: “Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.” Kennedy issued a challenge to Americans: “Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.” During his first two and a half years in office, Kennedy made the transition from politician to national leader. In foreign affairs he confronted Soviet challenges, made hard decisions, and won the respect of Soviet leaders and American citizens. He also spoke eloquently about the need to move toward a peaceful future. In domestic affairs he finally came to the conclusion that the federal government had to lead the struggle for civil rights. Added to his new maturity was his ability to inspire Americans to dream noble dreams and work toward lofty ends.

Lyndon B. Johnson JFK’s Vice President, Johnson served as U.S. President from 1963 to A Texan Democrat, Johnson worked as a teacher during the depression in a segregated school for Mexican Americans. In 1937 he began his political career and became known for his abilities of persuasion. Following Kennedy’s assassination, Johnson used his political talents to continue Kennedy’s policies in support of civil rights and aid for the poverty-stricken. These two goals were key to Johnson’s vision for America, which he called the Great Society. Born in Stonewall, Texas, Lyndon B. Johnson was raised in the Hill Country town of Johnson City. He attended Southwest Texas State College and then taught for several years in Cotulla, Texas. There, at a tiny segregated school for Mexican Americans, he confronted firsthand the challenges faced by poverty-stricken minority students, and the lessons he learned remained with him for the rest of his life. After teaching for several years, Johnson entered politics – first as a Texas congressman’s secretary and then as the head of the Texas National Youth Administration. In 1937, Johnson was elected to Congress, and during the next several decades he became the most powerful person on Capitol Hill. Elected to the Senate in 1948, Johnson proved himself a master of party politics and rose to the position of Senate majority leader in In the Senate, he was adept at avoiding conflict, building political coalitions, and working out compromises. His sill was instrumental in pushing the 1957 Civil Rights Act through Congress. In 1960, he hoped to be chosen the Democratic Party to run for President, but when Kennedy got the nomination Johnson agreed to join him on the ticket as the vice presidential nominee. A New Englander and a Catholic, Kennedy needed Johnson to help carry the heavily-Protestant South. Johnson was also popular both with Mexican American voters and in the Southwest. He was an important part of Kennedy’s victory in 1960.

Closure Question #3: Did the student revolts of this period contribute positively or negatively to society? Explain in at least 1 sentence. Before WWII, it was mostly members of Europe’s wealthier class who went to universities. After the war, European states encouraged more people to gain higher education by eliminating fees. As a result, enrollments from middle and lower classes grew dramatically. In France, 4.5% of young people went to universities in By 1965, the figure had increased to 14.5%. There were problems, however. Many European university classrooms were overcrowded, and many professors paid little attention to their students. Growing discontent led to an outburst of student revolts in the late 1960s. This student radicalism had several causes. Many protests were an extension of the revolts in American universities, often sparked by student opposition to the Vietnam War. Some students, particularly in Europe, believed that universities failed to respond to their needs or to realities of the modern world. Others believed they were becoming small cogs in the large and impersonal bureaucratic wheels of the modern world. Students protests in the late 1960s and early 1970s caused many people to rethink basic assumptions. Student upheavals, however, were not a turning point in the history of postwar Europe, as some people thought at the time. As student rebels became middle-class professionals, revolutionary politics became mostly a memory.

Closure Assignment #10 Answer the following questions based on what you have learned from Chapter 33, Section 5: Why was achieving victory in the Space Race viewed as being essential by both the Soviet Union and the United States? According to the Brezhnev Doctrine, the Soviet Union should have used military force in Vietnam to aid the Vietcong. Why do you think they did not do so? Did the student revolts of this period contribute positively or negatively to society? Explain in at least 1 sentence.

Apollo 11 / Neil Armstrong
The first manned-mission to the moon; In 1969, American Astronaut Armstrong became the first man to set foot on the moon. As he did so he made the following statement: “This is one small step for man; One giant leap for mankind.” Global transportation and communication systems are transforming the world community. People are connected and “online” throughout the world as they have never been before. Space exploration and orbiting satellites have increased our understanding of our world and of solar systems beyond our world. Since the 1970s, jumbo jet airlines have moved millions of people around the world each year. A flight between London and New York took half a day in Now, that trip takes only five or six hours. The Internet – the world’s largest computer network – provides quick access to vast quantities of information. The World Wide Web, developed in the 1990s, has made the Internet even more accessible to people everywhere. Satellites, cable television, facsimile (fax) machines, cellular telephones, and computers enable people to communicate with one another practically everywhere in the world. Communication and transportation systems have made the world a truly global village. The computer may be the most revolutionary of all technological inventions of the 20th century. The first computer was really a product of World War II. British mathematician Alan Turing designed the first electronic computer to crack enemy codes. Turing’s machine did calculations faster than any human. IBM of the United States made the first computer with stored memory in The IBM 1401, marketed in 1959, was the first computer used in large numbers in business and industry. These early computers used thousands of vacuum tubes to function. These machines took up considerable space. The development of the transistor and the silicon chip produced a revolutionary new approach to computers.

Détente A relaxation of tension and improved relations between two superpowers; During the late 1960s and 1970s the United States and Soviet Union, with roughly equal strength militarily, felt more secure and engaged in a more peaceful relationship. By the 1970s, détente allowed U.S. grain and consumer goods to be sold to the Soviet Union. However, détente collapsed in 1979 when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. A new period of East-West confrontation began. The Soviet Union wanted to restore a pro-Soviet regime in Afghanistan. The United States viewed this as an act of expansion. To show his disapproval, President Jimmy Carter canceled U.S. participation in the 1980 Olympic Games to be held in Moscow. He also placed an embargo on the shipment of U.S. grain to the Soviets. Relations became even chillier when Ronald Reagan became president. He called the Soviet Union an “evil empire” and began a military buildup and a new arms race. Regan also gave military aid to the Afghan rebels. By 1980, the Soviet Union was ailing. It had a declining economy, a rise in infant mortality rates, a dramatic surge in alcoholism, and poor working conditions. Within the Communist Party, a small group of reformers emerged. One was Mikhail Gorbachev. When the party chose him as leader in March 1985, a new era began. From the start Gorbachev preached the need for radical reforms based on perestroika, or restructuring. At first, this meant restructuring economic policy. Gorbachev wanted to start a market economy more responsive to consumers. It was to have limited free enterprise so that some businesses would be privately owned and operated.

Richard M. Nixon President of the United States from 1968 to 1974; Nixon’s conservative politics won him the support of southern white Americans, and during his presidency the United States improved is relationship with China. However, Nixon used illegal methods to gain political information about his opponents and maintain power. Richard Nixon’s political career had more ups and downs than a roller coaster ride. Brought up in hard times, he worked his way through college and law school. After service in the navy during World War II, Nixon was elected to the House of Representatives in 1946 and then to the Senate in As Dwight Eisenhower’s running mate in 1952, he became Vice President with Eisenhower’s victory, Nixon was not yet 40 years old. Then came the defeats. In 1960, Nixon narrowly lost to John F. Kennedy in the race for the White House. Two years later, Nixon’s career hit bottom when he lost an election to become governor of California. In 1968, however, Nixon made a dramatic comeback, narrowly defeating Democrat Hubert Humphrey to win the presidency. During the campaign for President, Nixon cast himself as the spokesperson for those he called Middle Americans, or the silent majority. Winning the support of Middle Americans proved a tricky task. Nixon believed that Americans had tired of the “big” government of Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society. However, he also believed that the American people still wanted the government to address various social ills, ranging from crime to pollution. Nixon’s solution was to call for the establishment of a “new federalism.” As he explained in his 1971 State of the Union address, the nation needed “to reverse the flow of power and resources from the State and communities to Washington and start power and resources flowing back from Washington to the States and communities. Closure Question #1: Do you think it was a wise political move for Nixon to visit Communist China and the Soviet Union? Why or Why not? (At least 1 sentence)

Henry Kissinger A German-born Jewish man, Kissinger and his family immigrated to the U.S. in 1938 at the age of 15 to escape Hitler’s persecution of Jews. Kissinger earned a Ph.D. at Harvard in 4 years and became Richard Nixon’s leading adviser on national security and international affairs, becoming Secretary of State in 1973. Zhou Enlai was the Chinese Premier who worked behind the scenes with Henry Kissinger to iron out sensitive issues in establishing a peaceful relationship between China and the United States. Zhou and Kissinger’s work culminated in a visit by President Richard Nixon to China in 1972 and the establishment of full diplomatic relations between the two countries in As a presidential candidate, Richard Nixon had promised to end U.S. military involvement in the Vietnam War. Recognizing the potency of Soviet power and the increasing unwillingness of many Americans to pay the costs of containing communism everywhere, Nixon developed a new approach to the Cold War. His bold program redefined American relations wit the two titans of global communism, China and the Soviet Union. During his years in office, Nixon fundamentally reshaped the way the United States approached the world. Before Nixon took office, most American leaders shared a common Cold War ideology. They stressed that there existed a basic conflict between democratic capitalist countries and totalitarian, communist ones. They divided the world into “us” and “them”, and they established policies based on an assumption common held that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” Therefore, a country opposed to communism was, by this definition, a friend of the United States. Nixon and Henry Kissinger altered this Cold War policy approach. At first glance, Richard Nixon’s partnership with Henry Kissinger seemed improbable. Nixon was a conservative California Republican, suspicious of the more liberal East Coast Republicans and exhausted with the political and strategic theories of Ivy League intellectuals. Kissinger was a Harvard-educated Jewish émigré from Germany and a prominent figure in East Coast intellectual circles. In several prior presidential campaigns, Kissinger had actually worked against Nixon. However, both men were outsiders equipped with an outsider’s readiness to question accepted orthodoxy. Closure Question #1: Do you think it was a wise political move for Nixon to visit Communist China and the Soviet Union? Why or Why not? (At least 1 sentence)

Watergate Scandal which culminated in the resignation of President Richard Nixon in 1974; Nixon ordered members of his reelection committee to break-in to the Democratic National Headquarters in the Watergate Hotel in Washington D.C. in 1972 to install wireless listening devices. The burglars were caught, leading to a 2 year investigation. 25th Amendment – Part of the U.S. Constitution which states that if the Vice-President resigns, the President must nominate a replacement. V.P. Spiro Agnew resigned in the face of a corruption scandal in 1973, leading Nixon to nominate Gerald Ford as his new V.P. Executive Privilege – Principle that the President has the right to keep certain information confidential; Nixon attempted to use this reasoning in refusing to turn over taped recordings of his phone calls from the oval office. In United States v. Nixon (1974) the Supreme Court ruled that Nixon was required to turn over the tapes, which revealed Nixon’s involvement in Watergate. Rather than face impeachment, Nixon resigned on August 8th, 1974. Closure Question #2: Did Richard Nixon position the United States to win the Cold War? Why or Why not? (At least 1 sentence)

SALT Otherwise known as SALT I, the treaty, agreed to by the U.S. and U.S.S.R. in 1972, froze the deployment of Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs) and placed limits on antiballistic missiles (ABMs). Though the agreement did not end the arms race between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R., it was a giant step toward that goal. Nixon’s trip to the People’s Republic of China prompted an immediate reaction from the Soviet Union, which had strained relations with both countries. Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev feared that improved U.S. – Chinese relations would isolate Russia. Therefore, he invited Nixon to visit Moscow. Nixon made the trip in May Afterward, the President reported to Congress that he and Brezhnev had reached agreements in a wide variety of areas. Nixon also announced plans to conduct a joint U.S.-Soviet space mission. However, by far the high point of the summit was the signing of the first Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty. The treaty froze the deployment of intercontinental ballistic missiles and placed limits on antiballistic missiles, but it did not alter the stockpiling of the more dangerous multiple independent reentry vehicles. SALT I did not end the arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union, but it was a giant step toward that goal. Realpolitik (German for “real politics”) was Nixon and Kissinger’s shared belief that political goals should be defined by concrete nationalist interests instead of abstract ideologies. Both argued that America needed to move past the Cold War stereotype of communism vs. democracy as evil vs. good, but instead recognize that communist nations could prove loyal allies while democratic nations could become enemies.

Closure Question #3: Why did Americans elect Ronald Reagan to the presidency in 1980? (At least 1 sentence) Ronald Reagan A movie actor and General Electric spokesperson, Reagan entered politics as a conservative Republican in the 1960s. After serving two terms as governor of California, Reagan defeated Jimmy Carter in the election of 1980 and served as President from 1981 to Reagan’s 3 key goals were to reduce the size of government, strengthen the military, and support traditional values. The growing conservative movement swept Ronald Reagan to victory in the 1980s election. Much more charismatic and polished than Barry Goldwater, Reagan made clear his opposition to big government, his support for a strong military, and his faith in traditional values. Just as importantly, he radiated optimism, convincing Americans that he would usher in a new era of prosperity and patriotism. Born in Tampico, Illinois, in 1911, Reagan suffered the hardships of the Great Depression as a young adult before landing a job in Hollywood as a movie actor. Never a big star, Reagan appeared in many “B” or low-budget films. His most famous starring role was in Knute Rockne, a film based on the life of Notre Dame’s legendary football coach. When his acting career began to wane, Reagan became a spokesperson for General Electric and toured the nation giving speeches. Although once a staunch New Dealer, Reagan had become a Goldwater conservative. In these speeches he began to criticize big government and high taxes and warned of the dangers of communism. In 1964, near the end of Goldwater’s presidential campaign, Reagan delivered a nationally televised address in which he spelled out these views. While the speech failed to bolster Goldwater’s campaign, it won the admiration of many conservatives. Two years later, Reagan won the governorship of California. He served for two terms as governor and nearly won the Republican presidential nomination in In 1980, he won the nomination by a landslide. His opponent was Jimmy Carter, the Democratic incumbent. As the election approached, Carter looked like a lame duck. Persistent inflation, the Iran hostage crisis, and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan made it easy for Reagan to cast the Carter presidency in a negative light. “Are you better off than you were four years ago?” Reagan asked audiences on the campaign trail, knowing that most Americans would say “No.” The race remained close until about one week before the election, when Reagan and Carter held their only presidential debate. In this debate, Reagan’s gifts as a communicator shone. He appeared friendly and even-tempered and calmed fears that he did not have enough experience to serve as President. On Election Day, Reagan won 50.6% of the popular vote.

Closure Assignment #11 Answer the following questions based on what you have learned from Chapter 33, Section 5: Do you think it was a wise political move for Nixon to visit Communist China and the Soviet Union? Why or Why not? (At least 1 sentence) Did Richard Nixon position the United States to win the Cold War? Why or Why not? (At least 1 sentence) Why did Americans elect Ronald Reagan to the presidency in 1980? (At least 1 sentence)

World War II and Restructuring the Post-War World

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World War II and Restructuring the Post-War World

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