Larger Concepts 1, Chester Nimitz-Hiroshima Emma Krass

Who did what: Larger Concepts 1, Chester Nimitz-Hiroshima -- Emma Krass Larger Concepts 2, Nagasaki-Holocaust-- Carter Socha Map, Axis Powers-Neville Chamberlain Eni Kruja MC 1, Munich Conference-phony war Frank Krol MC 2, Timeline, Battle of Britain-Charles de Gaulle Spencer Kiniry MC 3, collaborators-Auschwitz Keith Dylan West MC 4, Warsaw Ghetto-Pearl Harbor Julia Christina Janka MC 5, Teheran Conference-Warsaw Pact Matt Tahey MC 6, MC 7-- Robert Rust

Timeline 1938- Munich Conference held 1939- Germany attacks Poland, initiates World War II 1941- Japan attacks Pearl Harbor 1943- Churchill, Roosevelt, Stalin meet at Teheran 1944- Allied forces land in Normandy 1945- US. drops the atomic bomb on Japan

Putting Larger Concepts Together

1. What were the war aims of Japan and Germany? How are these related to the events from 1920 to 1939 in Europe and Asia?

Germany hoped to gain power through the war and these aims began to appear evident through their actions from 1920 to 1939. Germany’s main goal in the war was to create Lebensraum or living room for the German people. Hitler wanted to reunite the German people and right the wrongs of the Treaty of Versailles. He sought to spread into the Sudetenland, Anschluss, and Poland. He planned to expand east to areas that were either populated by Germans or non-Aryans, who were inferior to Germans. Germany not only desired living space east, but also desired an Aryan empire free of “subhuman” peoples. Hitler hoped to ultimately exterminate the European Jews. In the 1920s, the Weimar Republic remained weak and many Germans became disgusted with the Parliamentary Democracy. This dissatisfaction allowed for the rise of Hitler who became chancellor in 1933 and within two months, he became a dictator. He sought Lebensraum, rearmament and economic recovery for the German people. German remilitarized the Rhineland and began to illegally rearm their country. They recovered economically through pumping in state money to armament and consumer industries. Germany scapegoated the Jews and began to preach their racial superiority. Hitler withdrew from the League of Nations. In 1938 he annexed Austria to Germany and threatened Czechoslovakia on the pretext of protecting the German minority in the Sudetenland. In the month of September 1939, Poland fell to advancing German armies. Germany’s aggressive policies in the 1930s made its war aims clear. Japan, like Germany, hoped to gain land and influence and this is evident in their decisions from 1920 to 1939. Before the war, Japan’s economy was expanding rapidly. They needed Chinese markets and raw materials, but China boycotted their goods. This resulted in the military occupation of the Chinese province, Manchuria. Japan withdrew from the League of Nations, like Germany. In 1937,it began an undeclared war on China, gaining control of Peking, Shanghai, Nanking, Canton, and Hankow. In order to protect their own interests, the U.S.A., Great Britain, and the Soviet Union assisted the Chinese government, angering the Japanese powers. While World War II began, Japan expanded further to southern China, Indochina, and Thailand. These actions showed Japanese desire for dominance in Asia and beyond. Japan desired hegemony in Asia, declaring itself the liberators of the Asian against Westerners. They sought to gain territory to create more markets and gain more resources. Japan, like Germany, viewed themselves as superior, but morally superior, not racially, to Westerners and other Asians. They sought to “purify” themselves from morally corrupting influences. Japan’s actions before the war foreshadowed its quest for dominance in the War.

2. What factors led to the defeat of the Axis powers? If you were asked the question, “What nation contributed most to the Allied victory?” How would you answer the question? Compare the contributions of the European powers to those of the Soviet Union and the United States.

There were a variety of factors that led to the defeat of the Axis powers. The first was that there was no unity of strategy or command that could coordinate their actions to benefit each other. Japan was an entire continent away. In Europe the Axis were defeated by a war on multiple fronts in the west, east, and south. Another problem was that Italy was militarily and economically weak. Mussolini started wars in Africa against the British that pitched a technologically backward Italian army against the up to date machines and tactics of the well trained British army. Because of the Pact of Steel Germany was forced to intervene in Africa on Italy's behalf. This diverted valuable resources and military units into the harsh desert. Hitler also forced Germany into a war on two fronts, the very type of conflict he had tried to avoid with the Soviet Non Aggression Pact. Also this campaign was started in the late summer and none of the soldiers were supplied with winter uniforms so when an extremely harsh, and early winter set it in it severely hurt the German army. Since the German army depended upon speed and quickness of their armored forces when the fuel in these vehicles froze the army was crippled. The Germans were forced to commit huge amounts of troops to this conflict and their invading forces of three million soldiers was the largest ever. The third factor was the inability of the Germans to finish off Britain leaving a giant launching point for an allied attack into western Europe. Japan was doomed from the beginning against the United States because they were not able to sink the aircraft carriers at Pearl Harbor and could not match the USA economically. The nation that contributed most to the allied victory was the Soviet Union. When the Germans invaded in 1942 they were faced with the largest invading force ever. The Eastern front became a giant black hole for Germans to dump men and supplies into. The Russians occupied the full attention of Germany for almost two years. Their sacrifices made a second front in the West possible. They were also the allied country that actually fully defeated Germany. The Russians were the ones that not only captured Berlin but caused Hitler to commit suicide. The contribution of the European powers was trivial compared to those of the United States and Soviet Union. The majority of the European countries fell quickly to the German and only Britain remained. But even then Britain just absorbed Germanys attacks until it turned its attention to the Soviet Union. The United States aid kept Britain from falling apart economically. The United States and Soviet Union were the ones who committed the lionshare of the manpower and resources. Although there were some freedom fighters but they were spread out and ineffective.

Terms, People, Events

Axis Powers- (193s?6-1945) It began in 1936 with treaties of friendship between Germany and Italy and between Germany and Japan. The "Rome- Berlin Axis" became a full military alliance in 1939 under the Pact of Steel, and the Tripartite Pact of 1940 fully integrated the military aims of Germany, Italy, and Japan. Later Hungary (1940) and Bulgaria (1941) joined the powers. As Germany expanded, the territories it invaded were added to the Axis Powers. They were finally defeated in 1945 when Germany and Japan surrendered.

Atom Bomb- (1945) bombeds dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It was the most powerful weapon created at the time, capable of destroy whole cities. It forced Japan to surrender unconditionally without American deaths. The knowledge of its existence caused the Cold War, an arms race between USA and USSR, in which the two nations competed for the most deadly weapons.

Phony War- (3 September 1939-April 1940) Six month period between Great Britain’s and France’s declaration of war on Germany and actual military action. Nothing was done because of poor weather conditions. France’s morale deteriorated during this wait, considerably altering France’s performance in the beginning of the war.

Grand Alliance- (1941-1945)the alliance between the United Kingdom, United States, and the Soviet Union against Nazi Germany during World War II. Russia allied itself with Great Britain (the only power still standing in Europe) after Germany broke the Non-Aggression Pact of 1939. In 1941, USA joined the war officially after the Pearl Harbor attack in December, even though it had been helping Great Britain financially since the fall of France.

Neville Chamberlain-(1869-1940) British conservative Prime Minister. Chamberlain is best known for his appeasement foreign policy, and in particular for his signing of the Munich Agreement in 1938, conceding the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia to Germany. When Adolf Hitler continued his aggression by invading Poland, Britain declared war on Germany on 3 September 1939, and Chamberlain led Britain through the first eight months of the Second World War. His policy of appeasement reflected the popular feelings against a war, but it is often criticized in favor of a more aggressive policy. Ideally, if Great Britain had been more confrontational, it would have crushed the Nazis since their beginning. The Munich Agreement allowed Germany to expand and break up Czechoslovakia (thus making it easier for Germany to conquer Eastern Europe).

Munich Conference: On September 29, 1938, representatives of Germany, Great Britain, France, and Italy agreed that Nazi Germany’s acquisition of the Sudetenland (a German-majority region) in Czechoslovakia was allowed. The Allies of the First World War in a worse position then during the onset of the First World War, and as such were in no way prepared to directly contest Hitler’s demands.

Appeasement: The process by which the Allies from the First World War gave into Hitler’s territorial demands, as well as essentially acknowledging Nazi Germany’s rearmament policies. The Allies hadn’t sufficiently recovered from the First World War and the Great Depression, thus they were in no position to denounce resist Hitler’s expansionist policies.

Pact of Steel: Signed on May 22, 1939, the Pact of Steel was an alliance between Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, the most powerful fascist governments in Europe. Germany and Italy would also strengthen each other’s economies and trade military intelligence, providing both with militarily strong and influential allies.

Non-Aggression Pact of 1939: The Non-Aggression Pact served to be was one of the most controversial arrangements prior to the Second World War. Nazi Germany signed a pact with the Soviet Union in which either party wouldn’t attack the other, buying time for both sides to prepare for war against the western Allies. Another very significant and controversial aspect of the non- aggression pact was that Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union would divide the territory that they bordered, namely Poland and other Eastern European countries, between themselves, thus becoming neighboring countries. The pact would inevitably lead to Nazi invasion in 1941, which took Stalin by surprise because he believed Hitler would honor the agreement.

Battle of Britain- to prepare the way for a German invasion of Britain, the German airforce, under Reich marshal Hermann Göring, launched a series of air attacks against England. While first attacking British aircraft, airfields, and munitions centers, the German airforce soon shifted to targeting major population centers. The British were successful in maintaining air-superiority and inflicting serious losses to the Germans, forcing Hitler to abandon his invasion of England.

Winston Churchill- English Prime Minister who succeeded Chamberlain in 1940. It was under his leadership that England survived through the Battle of Britain, utilizing his superb public speaking skills to inspire the people of Britain. He is often considered one of the greatest war-time leaders of the century, and was instrumental in motivating the British people to stave off the German threat. He also was an important world leader as he was in charge of a leading Allied power, and thus had much influence in conferences such as Teheran. Blitzkrieg- “Lightening war”; the rapid advance accompanied by armored vehicles that typified the German military during WWII. It was employed particularly successfully against France, as Germany was easily able to bypass the Maginot line, and an armistice was forced on France after only two weeks.

Vichy- in the remaining two-fifths of France that was not directly occupied by the Germans (Southeastern France), Marshal Henri-Philippe Pétain created a collaborationist government that resided at Vichy, a spa city in central France. Vichy worked in partnership with the Germans for the rest of the war.

Charles de Gaulle- a French brigadier general who was opposed to the armistice and fled to London where he set up a Free French government in exile. He also led the Free French Forces, who were mainly drawn from the North-African French colonies and continued the fight against the Axis. collaborators - of individuals who were not citizens of the Third Reich at the outbreak of World War II and collaborated with the Nazi regime during the war. they Some were hostile towards Stalin's communism and believed that Hitler's Nazism was a far preferable choice.

Josip Broz (Tito) - Yugoslav revolutionary and statesman. He was secretary- general and president of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, supreme commander of the Yugoslav Partisans and the Yugoslav People’s Army and president of Yugoslavia. Tito was the chief architect of the “second Yugoslavia,” a socialist federation that lasted from World War II until 1991. He was the first Communist leader in power to defy Soviet hegemony, a backer of independent roads to socialism.

Final Solution - term used by the Third Reich to refer to the extermination of all people found to be unfit; resulted in the execution of 11 million men, women, and children, 6 million of them were Jews.

Zyklon B - was the trade name of a cyanide-based pesticide infamous for its use by Nazi Germany to kill human beings in gas chambers of extermination camps during the Holocaust.

Auschwitz - was a network of concentration and extermination camps built and operated by the Third Reich in Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany during World War II. It was the largest of the German concentration camps.

Warsaw Ghetto- the largest of all Jewish Ghettos in Nazi-occupied Europe during World War II; residents were sent to extermination camps as well; The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising lead to the annihilation of an additional 50,000 people; at least 300,000 Polish Jews lost their lives there

Chester Nimitz (1885-1966): commander of the American naval forces in the Pacific who inflicted a defeat on the Japanese navy that they could not recover from in the battle of Midway Hiroshima: On Monday, August 6, 1945, at 8:15 AM, the Atomic Bomb “Little Boy” was dropped here directly killing 80,000 people; bringing the war on the Pacific front to an end

Midway (3-6 June 1942): the critical battle of the Pacific war where American naval forces won, decimating the Japanese carrier forces; Japan lost 4 aircraft carriers, a heavy cruiser, more than 300 airplanes, and 5,000 men. It is considered the Pacific equivalent of the Battle of Stalingrad.

Stalingrad- controls railway and waterway communications of southern Russia; Germany fought the Soviets for control; largest battle on the Eastern Front; brutality and heavy losses; turning point in war since German forces never recovered

Great Patrotic War - term Russians sused to refer to WWII, which reflect their sense of dedication, natioanlism and sacrifice in the war

Tripartite Pact- Japan, Germany, and Italy; promised mutual support against aggression and acknowledged the legitimacy of their expansionsist efforst in Europe and asia

Pearl Harbor- (7 December 1941) Japan bombed the core of the American Pacific Fleet in Hawaii; crippled American naval power in the Pacific and led the U.S. to declare war against Japan

Teheran Conference - The first meeting of the Allies’ leaders (the Big Three) in November 1943 in Teheran, Iran. Roosevelt and Churchill promised Stalin to open up a second front against Germany to alleviate some of the pressure on the USSR, and in turn Stalin promised to attack Japan to aid the US in the Pacific.

Yalta Conference – The Big Three met again in February 1945 to decide what they were going to do for post-war Europe. Germany was to be partitioned among the Allies and occupied, and the conquered nations of Europe were to be re-established with democratic elections, but the wording was vague so the USSR used it to keep the government it had installed in Poland.

Potsdam Conference – The Big Three met in Potsdam, a suburb of Berlin, a final time, but this time the leaders were different; Truman replaced the late FDR and Attlee replaced Churchill as PM halfway through. Other circumstances had changed, since the USSR was occupying Central and Eastern Germany and the US had tested the atomic bomb, changing the power dynamic between the countries. On the agenda was the partitioning of the postwar world and resolving the problems of the war in the Far East. This included the details regarding the division of Germany; the movement of populations from Czechoslovakia, Austria, and Italy; the creation of a Council of Foreign Ministers to administer the agreed upon zones of occupation; and issuing a proclamation demanding unconditional surrender from the Japanese government. It was also agreed that Stalin could demand reparations from Germany to help rebuild the Soviet Union that had lost 10% of its population and 1/3 of its industry, along with most of its agricultural output.

Douglas MacArthur – Commander of the US Forces in the Far East, during the beginning of WWII, he was in charge of the Philippines when it was conquered by the Japanese. After he withdrew, he was named Supreme Commander of the Southwest Pacific, helping create the island-hopping strategy. After Japan’s surrender he oversaw the occupation of Japan from 1945 to 1951.

Warsaw Pact – it was a mutual defense treaty between eight communist nations in Eastern Europe. Engineered by the USSR as a response to NATO, it created satellite states to ease Russia’s fears of being invaded again. Though it was created in 1955, it merely formalized the existing conditions because Russia had occupied Eastern Europe after the war.

Nagasaki - The city where the second atomic bomb was dropped on

Big Three - The leaders of the three major Allies of World War II: Joseph Stalin, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill

Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere - was a concept created and promulgated during the Shōwa era by the government and military of the Empire of Japan. It represented the desire to create a self-sufficient "bloc of Asian nations led by the Japanese and free of Western powers"

Holocausts - was the genocide of approximately six million European Jews during World War II, a programme of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi Germany, led by Adolf Hitler, throughout Nazi-occupied territory. Of the nine million Jews who had resided in Europe before the Holocaust, approximately two-thirds perished. In particular, over one million Jewish children were killed in the Holocaust, as were approximately two million Jewish women and three million Jewish men.

Map Exercise

In what ways did the expansion of Germany and Japan during WWII reflect their pre-war concerns with imperialism? How did the expansion reflect the failure of treaty provisions after WWI?

Germany’s initial expansion by absorbing Austria and the Sudetenland was not viewed as an imperialistic endeavor, because, as Hitler claimed, the purpose of this expansion was to protect the rights of the Germans in those territories. Nevertheless, when the Nazi expansion included Poland and Czechoslovakia, it became clear that Germany’s new borders were being extended with an imperialistic intent. Hitler’s concept of Lebensraum, demonstrates the exploitative and racist nature of imperialism. Lebensraum was a demand for more territory for the German people; this territory was to be usurped from the occupied lands. This usurpation was excusable because, according to Nazi ideology, the Germans were the worthy Arian race which needed more room to procreate which the Slavs, gypsies, and Communists were “racially undesirable” and could therefore be sacrificed for the benefit of the Arians. Germany’s later expansion continued the exploitative nature of imperialism. Germany took over the Balkan’s states in order to use its natural resources (which were necessary for the military), and it agricultural produce (crucial to a population involved in total war). Germany’s expansion was first excused because of failures in the Treaty of Versailles. The extensively harsh penalties placed on Germany after WWI gave the Nazis the opportunity to gain power and granted the Western countries an excuse to hide behind the idea of appeasement. The treaty of Versailles was not respected when Germany militarized the Rhine valley, but the Western powers were in no position to fight back and enforce the provision.Japan had emerged as one of the victors of WWI, but had received no considerable gain from the war treaties. Japan aimed to create an empire and in order to compete with the industrialized powers. Being an island, the natural resources were very limited and Japan had to rely on trade with USA for its rubber. In 1931, Japan started its exploitative expansion by invading Manchuria. In doing so, it broke the provisions of the League of Nations, but the other members of the league had no power stop Japan or punish it somehow, since the League had no military power.Axis Powers- (1936-1945) It began in 1936 with treaties of friendship between Germany and Italy and between Germany and Japan. The "Rome-Berlin Axis" became a full military alliance in 1939 under the Pact of Steel, and the Tripartite Pact of 1940 fully integrated the military aims of Germany, Italy, and Japan. Later Hungary (1940) and Bulgaria (1941) joined the powers. As Germany expanded, the territories it invaded were added to the Axis Powers. They were finally defeated in 1945 when Germany and Japan surrendered.Atom Bomb- (1945) bombed dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It was the most powerful weapon created at the time, capable of destroy whole cities. It forced Japan to surrender unconditionally without American deaths. The knowledge of its existence caused the Cold War, an arms race between USA and USSR, in which the two nations competed for the most deadly weapons.Phony War- (3 September 1939-April 1940) Six month period between Great Britain’s and France’s declaration of war on Germany and actual military action. Nothing was done because of poor weather conditions. France’s morale deteriorated during this wait, considerably altering France’s performance in the beginning of the war.Grand Alliance- (1941-1945)the alliance between the United Kingdom, United States, and the Soviet Union against Nazi Germany during World War II. Russia allied itself with Great Britain (the only power still standing in Europe) after Germany broke the Non-Aggression Pact of 1939. In 1941, USA joined the war officially after the Pearl Harbor attack in December, even though it had been helping Great Britain financially since the fall of France.Neville Chamberlain-(1869- 1940) British conservative Prime Minister. Chamberlain is best known for his appeasement foreign policy, and in particular for his signing of the Munich Agreement in 1938, conceding the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia to Germany. When Adolf Hitler continued his aggression by invading Poland, Britain declared war on Germany on 3 September 1939, and Chamberlain led Britain through the first eight months of the Second World War. His policy of appeasement reflected the popular feelings against a war, but it is often criticized in favor of a more aggressive policy. Ideally, if Great Britain had been more confrontational, it would have crushed the Nazis since their beginning. The Munich Agreement allowed Germany to expand and break up Czechoslovakia (thus making it easier for Germany to conquer Eastern Europe).

Making Connections

1. What was the goal of Hitler’s foreign policy before 1939? What was the policy of appeasement? Why was it necessary?

Hitler’s foreign policies and goals largely focused on acquiring land in Eastern Europe that would be used as lebensraum, one of Hitler’s most desired objectives. Lebensraum was the required and necessary living space that Nazi Germany needed if it was going to expand economically and geographically. The newly acquired territory would serve as prime settlement locations to expand German territory, dominance, and influence in the area. However, the Soviet Union stood between Hitler’s goal of acquiring territory. The Soviet Union, after Stalin’s numerous purges, was in no position to adequately respond to a German invasion, and Hitler believed that in order to prevent fighting a two-front war (the leading cause of Germany’s defeat in the First World War) he would have to maintain a relative peace with Great Britain, which he hoped would be content with his crusade against communism. However, Hitler’s attempts to acquire lebensraum became undemocratic when he utilized the military to occupy many territories, although these territories (those that had a regional German majority) felt that they were being liberated. Austria and the Sudetenland were notable areas that were content now that they were in a united Germany, much to the displeasure of Czechoslovakia and other Eastern European countries. Western European countries, namely France and Great Britain, couldn’t directly contest Hitler’s demand of territory because of the deeply felt negative effects of the depression as well as the First World War. They were in no position to demand that Hitler stop annexing territory and instead called for a relative peace, which took on the form of appeasement, a deliberate allowance of Hitler to achieve his territorial demands while believing that he wouldn’t yet declare war. Appeasement was somewhat necessary in that it initially boosted support for the British government and fostered a sense of peace, as Germany was believed that it wouldn’t attack. However, appeasement did nothing to aid Czeczoslovakia and other Eastern European nations that lost significant territory at their own expense at the hands of a rapidly expansionist regime.

2. How did the first stage of World War II in Europe go? How did Hitler’s forces sweep across Europe so swiftly?

The first stage of World War II was entirely dominated by Nazi Germany. Hitler’s policy of “Lebensraum” for the German people was put into motion beginning in 1938, when he annexed Austria. He then demanded “freedom” for the German people of the Sudetenland area of Czechoslovakia, with the goal of destroying the Czech state. Western statesmen failed to realize Hitler’s commitment to destroying Czechoslovakia or his willingness to use force to do so. France, and ally of Czechoslovakia wanted to avoid war with Germany, and Britain also pursued a continued policy of appeasement. In 1938 the Munich Conference was held, where Chamberlain, Édouard Daladier (French Prime Minister), Mussolini, and Czechoslovakia convened and ceded the Sudetenland to Hitler. In ceding the Sudetenland, Chamberlain assumed that through the appeasement, Hitler’s desire for Lebensraum would be satiated. However, German troops soon occupied the rest of Czechoslovakia, assumed control of Gdansk and the Polish Corridor, and forced Lithuania to cede Memel. Hitler made his alliance with Mussolini through the Pact of Steel, and temporarily removed the USSR from the equation by signing a pact of mutual neutrality, the Non-Aggression Pact of 1939. In doing so Hitler believed that Britain and France would further appease Germany and avoid war with Hitler while he took control of Poland, Bessarabia, Latvia, and Lithuania. However, before Hitler could gain control of Poland, the British and French promised to aid Poland in the event of an attack. However, on September 1st, 1939, Hitler invaded Poland and had won within a month, while Russia invaded from the east. On September 3rd, Britain and France declared war on Germany, although they were unable to aid Poland. For six months, France and Britain were in a “phony war” with Germany, unable to act and waiting for Hitler’s next move. In spring, Hitler conquered Denmark and Norway, moved through the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg, and invaded France, and France fell within two weeks. Marshal Henri-Philippe Pétain began leading Vichy France in collaboration with Hitler, and Germany began the Battle of Britain, threatening to invade Britain. While the British were able to stave off the possibility of a German invasion, Germany did gain control in the Balkans in Yugoslavia, Greece (where they routed the British at Crete), as well as Hungary and Romania. What made Hitler’s forces so powerful and successful was his employment of the blitzkrieg, or lightening war, in which there is a rapid advance of troops accompanied by armored vehicles. Many of the countries created after World War I had fallen into dictatorships and were weak both militarily and economically as well as divided ethnically. All of these factors made Hitler’s military all the more successful while Britain and France, the only countries that could have viably acted aggressively in response to Hitler’s movement for lebensraum, pursued a policy of appeasement, which only facilitated Hitler’s goals.

3. At whom where Hitler's policies of racial purity directed? What was the final solution? How was it enforced? why did the allies not take steps to halt the destruction of Europe's Jews?

Hitler's racial purity was directed toward any person who was deemed "unfit." This included people such as the mentally handicapped but most importantly the Jewish population. The "final solution" was the term used by the Third Reich to refer to the extermination of all people found to be unfit; resulted in the execution of 11 million men, women, and children, 6 million of whom were Jewish. In the beginning the work for this "solution" was carried out by the German SS. Later on as all the Jews were rounded up into Ghettos Reinhard Heydrich the leader of the SS held a planning conference to make sure the whole operation was carried out smoothly. The plan began with the invasion of Poland with mass killings Jews and non-Jews alike and this continued with the invasion of Russia. All of the executions were carried out by the SS. Then Hitler began a mass propaganda campaign to make the German soldiers believe that they were on a holy campaign which escalated the extermination policies even further. By 1941 the Third Reich began erecting the huge network of the infamous extermination and labor camps. On December 17, 1942, the Allies issued a condemnation of Nazi atrocities against the Jews, but this was the only such declaration made prior to 1944. Other practical measures which were not taken concerned the refugee problem. Tens of thousands of Jews sought to enter the United States, but they were barred from doing so by the stringent American immigration policy. The Allies refused to bomb the death camp of Auschwitz and/or the railway lines leading to that camp. So overall before the war and as the Allies were fighting their way into Germany there was very little attempt by the allies to help the Jewish population under Nazi control. The best bet as the allies saw it was to fight their way into Germany for an unconditional surrender to put an end to the war and the "final solution."

4. What was the Great Patriotic War? Why was it so critical to Allied victory in World War II? What was its outcome?

As Hitler's troops approached Moscow, Stalin called for the people to help him in "the Great Patiotic War", in reference to the natioanlistic and dedicated fighting during World War II. This term goes back to the resistance to Napoleon's invasion, as well as the eastern front in World War I. During World War II, while it simply represented the eastern front, it also stood for the dedication, nationalism, and sacrifices of war shared by the Russians.The brutality of the advancing German army intensified the Soviet patriotism; however, 20 million Soviet people, soldiers and civilians, men, women, and children, died throughout World War II. More people starved due to the lack of food. The Great Patriotic War led to a change in Soviet attitude towards the world. It left them with a continuing fear of invasion. Soviet citizens felt that they had given the most out of any country to defeat Hitler; for them, their suffering during the war made the Allied victory possible.

5. Why did the United States enter World War II? What agreements between the Allies were necessary in order to win the war in Europe?

The United States entered the war officially on December 8, 1941 due to the attack on Pearl Harbor, but before that it had been extending massive amounts of aid to Britain and the USSR in the form of military equipment and raw materials. Japanese-American relations had soured after Japan joined the Tripartite Pact in 1940, and after they invaded Manchuria in 1941. After Japan and Germany had declared war on the US and the US joined the war, there was still the issue of cooperating with the other Allies, notably the USSR. Stalin distrusted the other two allies, and that only increased as they delayed opening up a second front to take some of the pressure off of the USSR, who was fighting the entirety of Germany’s forces. The Big Three discussed this at the Teheran Conference, where issues were settled, and Britain and the US promised to open a second front (culminating in D-Day) and the USSR promised to open up a front in the Far East against Japan by 6 months after victory in Europe. These tensions also manifested after the war in the Yalta and Potsdam Conferences there were many disagreements about what was to be done with Europe after the war, with Britain and the US wanting free elections and the USSR wanting satellite countries.

6. What was the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere? In what sense were Japan’s racial attitudes similar to those of Hitler?

The Japanese entered World War II by appealing to Southeast Asian leaders, presenting themselves as the liberators of Asian peoples from Western colonialism and imperialism. This approach struck a responsive chord as the Japanese established what they called the Greater East Asia Co- Prosperity Sphere. It began in 1940 and lasted until the summer of 1945. The reorganization of east and Southeast Asia under Japanese hegemony constituted a redefinition of world geography, with Japan at the center. The Japanese fashioned a romanticized vision of the family living in harmony, each member knowing his place and enjoying the complimentary division of responsibilities and reciprocities that made family life work smoothly. Behind the pleasant image lurked the reality of a brutal power structure forcing subject peoples to accept massively inferior positions in a world fashioned exclusively for Japanese desires and needs. The Japanese viewed Southeast Asia principally as a market for Japanese manufactured goods, a source of raw materials, and a source of profits for Japanese capital invested in rubber, mining, and raw cotton.Ba Maw, Burma’s leader, said at the Assembly of the Greater East Asiatic Nations held in Tokyo in November 1943, “My Asiatic blood has always called to other Asiatics… This I not the time to think with our minds; this is the time to think with our blood.” Japan’s racial attitudes generally agreed with this point of view; they did not denigrate Western people, but rather elevated themselves as a people descended from divine origins. Stressing their unique mythical history, the Japanese felt a strong sense of moral superiority. They believed that virtue was on their side in their mission to stop Western expansion in Asia and to take their “proper place” as the leading people in Asia. Just as Hitler did, the Japanese encouraged people to purify themselves by accepting difficult and sometimes brutal demands, and by rejecting foreign influences. Both regimes wanted to achieve superiority for their respective races.

7. What were the decisions reached at the series of conferences held by the leaders of the Allied powers? Why did the Soviet Union determine that its security required control of eastern Europe?

The leaders of the United States, Great Britain, and the Soviet Union – the Big Three, as they were called – met three times between 1943 and 1945: first at Teheran; then in February 1945 at Yalta, a Russian Black Sea resort; and finally in July and August 1945 at Potsdam, a suburb of Berlin. They coordinated their attacks on Germany and Japan and discussed their plans for postwar Europe. After Allied victory, the governments of both Germany and Japan would be totally abolished and completely reconstructed. No deals would be made with Hitler or his successors; no peace would be negotiated with the enemy; surrender would be unconditional. Germany would be disarmed and denazified, and its leaders would be tried as war criminals. The armies of the Big Three occupied Germany, each with a separate zone, but the country would be governed as a single economic unit. The Soviet Union, it was agreed, could collect reparations from Germany. With Germany and Japan defeated, a United Nations organization would provide the structure of a lasting peace in the world.Stalin expected that the Soviet Union would decide the future of the territories of Eastern Europe that the Soviet army had liberated from Germany. This area was vital to the security of the war- devastated Soviet Union; Stalin saw it as a protective barrier against another attack from the west. Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and Poland, the Big Three decided, would have pro-Soviet governments. Since Soviet troops occupied these countries in 1945, there was little that the Anglo-Americans could do to prevent Russian control unless they wanted to go to war against the USSR. Churchill realistically accepted this. But for Americans who took seriously the proclamations of President Roosevelt that their country had fought to restore freedom and self-determination to peoples oppressed by tyranny, Soviet power in Eastern Europe proved to be a bitter disappointment.