The event that brought the United States into World War II was Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on December 7, 1941.  The U.S. declared war on December 8, 1941. By this time, Hitler had violated the terms of his non-aggression pact with the Soviet Union and had attacked it. 

Japan, Germany, and Italy will be known as the AXIS Powers.  The United States, Great Britain, the Free French under the leadership of Charles De Gaulle, and their allies will be collectively known as the ALLIES.

Initially, the United States carried out a "holding" action in the Pacific against Japan with the exception of the Doolittle Raid on Tokyo in early 1942.  That sent a message to Japan and lifed the morale of Americans.

The first major offensive involving the United States was in North Africa where the Americans and the British defeated German and Italian forces.  American leadership was provided by General Dwight D. Eisenhower and George C. Patton while the British were commanded by General Bernard Montgomery.  A major "turning point" victory in North Africa was the British victory at El Alamein.

After victory in North Africa, the allies turned to southern Europe.  Joseph Stalin, leader of the Soviet Union, was wanting President Roosevelt of the United States and Prime Minister Winston Churchill of Great Britain to open a second front in western Europe that would cause Hitler to reduce pressure on the Soviet Union.  They would not at this time.

3 TURNING POINT BATTLES IN WORLD WAR II:  El Alamein in North Africa, Stalingrad in the Soviet Union, and Midway in the Pacific

JUNE 6, 1944:  D-DAY, also known as Operation Overlord and the INVASION OF NORMANDY occurred.  This was the second front that Stalin had long wanted.  The United States, Britain, Canada, and the Free French participated in this attack on the Normandy coast. The code names for the beaches where the landings would take place were Gold, Juno, Sword, Utah, and Omaha (deadliest).  10,549 soldiers died, 6,603 of them were Americans, 3,000 British, and 946 Canadians.  Watch the movie, "Saving Private Ryan."  THIS WILL BE THE BEGINNING OF THE END FOR THE GERMANS as they begin to retreat from western Europe and are retreating from the Soviet Union after their defeat at Stalingrad. The decision for this attack was made at the TEHERAN CONFERENCE in November, 1943 where FDR and Churchill met with Stalin.  ALSO, Stalin made his desire for a "BUFFER" zone in eastern Europe known as this time.  FDR indicated that he would not oppose Stalin's effort but would not take a public position supporting his claim.

The Germans and Italians were now being squeezed between the Americans and British attacking Europe from the west, the Soviets attacking from the east, and the Americans and British attacking from the south through Italy. 

HOLOCAUST:  This given by the Jews and the west for Hitler's FINAL SOLUTION.  This was Hitler's effort to rid Europe of all Jews.  Concentration and Death camps were discovered in Germany and Poland as the allies advanced on Germany where the Jews were being put to death.  More notable Death Camps:  Dachau, Auschwitz, Buchenwald, Treblinka, Sobibor.  SIX MILLION Jews were killed by the Nazis.  The United States had been made aware of the Death camps but showed indifference toward them until the discoveries were made. 

BATTLE OF THE BULGE:  Dec., 1944; Germany's last major offensive in Europe.  At the town of Bastogne, Captain McAuliffe answered the German demand for the American surrender with the famous statement, "Nuts."
PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION OF 1944:  FDR elected to a record 4th term; Harry Truman was Vice-president.

YALTA CONFERENCE:  February, 1945....FDR and Churchill met with Stalin at this resort city on the Black Sea.  Discussed the occupation of Germany, the creation of the United Nations, and the situation regarding eastern Europe.  Stalin let be known that he wanted eastern Europe as a SPHERE OF INFLUENCE for the Soviet Union.  Stalin was not concerned about free elections nor self-determination for these eastern European countries.  He wanted them as a "buffer" zone against any future attacks from the west.  FDR has been criticized as giving away too much at Yalta but Stalin's armies were already in control of most of it. 

APRIL 12, 1945:  FDR dies of a cerebral hemorrhage at Warm Springs, Georgia, the Little Whitehouse, while on vacation.  He would go there for the warm springs to help his polio.  He had been unable to walk without the assistance of leg braces and canes for many years since contracting polio.  He used a wheelchair but you seldom saw pictures of this.  HARRY TRUMAN became president.

ELBE RIVER:  Where American and Soviet troops met for the first time.  The Soviets had taken Berlin.

MAY 8, 1945:  GERMANY SURRENDED; known as V-E Day.  Hitler had earlier committed suicide as the Soviets adavanced on Berlin. 


WAR IN THE PACIFIC:  Strategy was known as "island hopping" or "leapfrogging."  Leaders of this strategy were Admiral Chester Nimitz, Commander of Naval Forces in the Pacific, and General Douglas MacArthur, Commander of the miltary forces in the Pacific.

The fall of the Philippines to the Japanese was a major defeat for the United States and resulted in the infamous Bataan Death March.  General MacArthur was ordered by President to evacuate to Australia to prevent his capture by the Japanes.

Battle of Coral Sea:  May 7-8, 1942, the first naval battle fought entirely by carrier-based aircraft.  It stopped the Japanese advance on Australia.

Battle of Midway: June 3-6, 1942, considered the most important naval battle of the the Pacific war.  4 Japanese carriers were sunk.

Island-hopping campaign begins by army and marines.

Battle of Leyte Gulf:  Oct. 23-26, 1944, largest naval battle in world history;  KAMIKAZE introduced by Japan;  results in U.S. naval control in the Pacific.

Some island battles:  Iwo Jima (Feb., 1945, 4,189 deaths), Okinawa (April, 1945, 11,260 deaths), Tarawa, Saipan, Philippines, Guadalcanal.

POTSDAM CONFERENCE:  July, 1945, Truman learned that the Atomic bomb was ready to be used.  The Manhattan Project was the official name for the program to develop the atomic bomb. 

August 6, 1945: United States dropped the first ATOMIC BOMB on HIROSHIMA, JAPAN.
August 9, 1945: Dropped the second atomic bomb on NAGASAKI, JAPAN.

JAPAN SURRENDERED following the dropping of the second atomic bomb. 
August 15, 1945:  V-J DAY; t\he official Japanese surrender will be September 2, 1945 aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay.

During the war, discrimination toward Japanese-Americans occurred.  On the west coast, Japanese-Americans were placed in internment camps.  Executive Order 9066, signed by FDR, authorized their being forcefully placed in these camps.  In the Supreme Court case of KOREMATSU v. U.S., the evacuations were upheld. 

Attitudes towards African-Americans changed little during the war.  Segregation continued in the military and at home.  However, major contributions were made by the Tuskegee Airmen and other African-American units. 

Movement to where the jobs were during the war occurred.  Women flooded the workforce and "Rosie the Riveter" became a symbol to represent the American woman during the war.  YET, most women remained at home. 

The movie and music industry contributed to the war:  songs:  "God Bless America" sung by Kate Smith, and "White Christmas" sung by Bing Crosby..


IMMEDIATE EFFECTS OF WWII:  Devastation and loss of life in Europe, Asia, and North Africa;  recognition of the Holocaust; overthrow of fascism; founding of the United Nations; demilitarization of Germany and Japan; rise of the United States and the USSR as super powers; Soviet control of eastern Europe.

LONG-TERM EFFECTS OF WWII:  Cold War; divided Germany; formation of NATO and the Warsaw Pact; development of nuclear capability

POST WORLD WAR II WORLD

UNITED NATIONS CREATED.

Post-WWII world will be dominated by the beginning and continuation of what becomes known as the COLD WAR.  Born out of Stalin's refusal to withdraw Soviet forces from eastern Europe following WWII and his refusal to allow free elections by the people to determine what form of government they wanted.  It will be a war of words between the two superpowers but military conflicts will develop between communist and non-communist forces after World War II, most notably in KOREA and VIETNAM.  It was the result of the difference between the ideologies of democracy and communism.  Growing concern developed among western leaders as communist groups began to attempt to forcefully spread communism.

GERMANY WAS DIVIDED INTO 4 ZONES OF OCCUPATION BY THE UNITED STATES, GREAT BRITAIN, FRANCE, AND THE SOVIET UNION FOLLOWING WWII.  THE GERMAN CAPITAL OF BERLIN WAS ALSO DIVIDED INTO 4 ZONES OF OCCUPATION BY THESE COUNTRIES.

1946:  Winston Churchill's "IRON CURTAIN" speech in Fulton, Missouri.

CONTAINMENT: 1947,  the official U.S. policy toward the spread of communism following WWII.  Means the U.S. will attempt to keep it where it existed at the time, not allowing the spread of communism. 

TRUMAN DOCTRINE:  1947, U.S. policy "to protect free peoples who were resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or outside pressure."  Adopted when Greece and Turkey were being threatened by communism.  This begins the Cold War.

MARSHALL PLAN:  1947, U.S. economic plan to reconstruct Europe following WWII.  USSR refuses and will not allow those countries under its control to accept any assistance.

*******1947:  United Nations recommends that PALESTINE be DIVIDED into a JEWISH STATE and an ARAB STATE.  Arabs reject this plan.......BALFOUR DECLARATION:  a British statement in 1917 promising in Palestine a national home for the Jewish people..........ZIONISM:  the movement that called for a state for the Jewish people in their homeland, Palestine.

1948:  June...Stalin blockaded all highway, rail, and water traffic to western Berlin.  This initiates the BERLIN AIRLIFT in which the U.S. and G.B. airlifted supplies to Berlin.

MAY 14, 1948:  THE NATION OF ISRAEL CREATED and war breaks out between Arabs and Jews on May 15, 1948 that lasts until 1949. 

May, 1949:  U.S., G.B., and France create the German Federal Republic from their 3 zones of occupation. (West Germany)
October, 1949:  Soviet Union creates the German Democratic Republic under their control.  (East Germany)

April, 1949:  NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) established (In 1955, the Soviets establish the WARSAW PACT to counter NATO.)

October, 1949:  PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA created under the leadership of Mao Tse Tung (Mao Zedong).  Chiang Kai-shek flees to Formosa.

1950:  NORTH KOREA(Communist) INVADES SOUTH KOREA(deomcratic) and starts the Korean Conflict.

1953: Stalin dies; Nikita Khrushchev comes to power in the USSR.
          Korean Conflict (War) ends.

INDOCHINA 

Vietnam was one country in Indochina.  Laos and Cambodia were the other two.  Indochina had been colonized by the French in the 1800s.  The French exploited the Vietnamese.  The Japanese captured Vietnam in WWII.  The Vietnamese organized a resistance movement against the Japanese known as the Viet Minh, under the leadership of HO CHI MINH (Communist).  This will become the strongest political force in Vietnam and Ho Chi Minh was very popular.  He declared INDEPENDENCE on 9/2/1945. 

France organized a government in opposition to Ho Chi Minh's government and when talks failed between the French and Vietnamese, war broke out in 1946.  THE UNITED STATES SUPPORTED FRANCE WHEN THE USSR SUPPORTED HO.

France was defeated in 1954 at DIEN BIEN PHU and in the following treaty negoitations known as the GENEVA CONFERENCE, Laos and Cambodia were granted independence but VIETNAM WAS TO BE TEMPORARILY DIVIDED, the north governed by the Viet Minh and the south under a government backed by the French.  Agreement was made to hold elections to determine the fate of Vietnam.  The United States supported the South Vietnamese government led by Ngo Dinh Diem.  DIEM REFUSED TO LET THE ELECTIONS BE HELD AND HE BECAME PRESIDENT OF SOUTH VIETNAM.  Diem became unpopular among the people and his opponents formed the NATIONAL LIBERATION FRONT(NLF) with a military wing known as the VIETCONG.  They want to reunite Vietnam. 

Ho Chi Minh aids the NLF in the civil war that occurred and the United States supplied the South Vietnamese army.  President JOHN F. KENNEDY increased U.S. aid and sent 10,000 military ADVISORS in 1961. 

1963:  Diem overthrown

**********1964: GULF OF TONKIN INCIDENT:  results in the President Lyndon B. Johnson being given very broad powers to wage war in the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution and will provide the legal basis major military involvement in Indochina.  COMBAT TROOPS WILL BE COMMITTED TO VIETNAM. 

March, 1965:  NORTH VIETNAMESE ARMY ENTER SOUTH VIETNAM;  U.S. troops fighting with South Vietnames troops against the NVA and the Vietcong.

PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION OF 1968:  RICHARD M. NIXON ELECTED U.S. PRESIDENT and announces a policy of VIETNAMIZATION, meaning the gradual reduction of U.S. forces.

U.S. will begin to bomb North Vietnam.

1973:  PARIS PEACE ACCORDS:  North Vietnamese troops could remain in South Vietnam; NLF recognized as a legitimate political group in South Vietnam U.S. could continue to supply the South Vietnamese army; U.S. combat troops to leave. 

EFFECTS:  58,000 U.S. troop deaths; 300,000 wounded; $150 billion spent; longest war to that time.

Congress will finally cut off aid and in 1975, South Vietnam fell to the North and the country was united.

550,000 U.S. troops at the height of our involvement. 

OTHER KEY EVENTS OF THE COLD WAR ERA:

1961:  Berlin Wall built by the Soviets

1962:  Cuban Missile Crisis

THE UNITED STATES AND SOVIET UNION EVENTUALLY DEVELOPED A POLICY OF DETENTE but serious differences continued to exist.  RONALD REAGAN, elected President in 1980, was strongly anti-communist and anti-Soviet Union.  He frequently verbally attacked the Soviet Union.  In the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev came to power.  Under his leadership, the Soviet Union allowed free elections in the eastern European countries and the USSR began to disintegrate.  The Berlin Wall came down in 1989 and the Soviet Union ended in 1991.  Reagan and Gorbachev developed a close relationship.

1920s

Known as the "Roaring Twenties"  The economy roared except for 2 brief periods and the automobile was central to the boom. 

Movie industry most popular form of entertainment:  KDKA out of Pittsburgh was the first commercial radio station. 
Sports grew:  Boxing, Baseball, Football

Red Scare

The "FLAPPER" was the new woman

Writers expressed disillusionment:  Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Henry Mencken, Sinclair Lewis

African Americans continued to experience discrimination:  Marcus Garvey estab. United Nego Improvement Association to promote black pride and nationalism;  eventually found guilty of defrauding investors and deported.

Harlem Renaissance:  a period of exceptional black writing and expressed black nationalism:  Langston Hughes was known as the poet laureate of Harlem, Alaine Locke was the first black to be awarded a Rhodes Scholarship; black musicians:  Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington

Strong anti-immigrant mood in America:  NATIVISM; Sacco-Vanzetti was a prime example

KKK revival:  re-organized  in 1915 by Methodist minister William Simmons at Stone Mountain, Georgia; a new movie, "The Birth of a Nation" glorified the Klan

Fundamentalism emerges as science clashed with religion:  The Scopes Monkey Trial in Dayton, TN was evidence of this; two famous attorneys:  Clarence Darrow and William Jennings Bryan

PROHIBITION was an issue:  18th Amendment banned sale of alcohol;  didn't work as "Speakeasies" were started in larger cities;  mobsters such as Al Capone and "Bugsy" Moran become famous

President Warren G. Harding, elected in 1920, died of a massive heart attack in August, 1923.  He had campaigned on the slogan, "A Return to Normalcy."  This resonated with Americans following World War I.  Calvin Coolidge became President.

Election of 1924:  Coolidge (Republican) defeated John Davis, the Democrat nominee; was division in the Democratic party; some supported Al Smith, New York governor, a Catholic, and William McAdoo, as strict prohibitionst from California; the party chose Davis.

Election of 1928:  Coolidge chose not to run:  Herbert Hoover, Republican, defeated Al Smith after the Republicans attacked Smith and his Cathoic religion and urbanism.  Republicans carried 5 southern states.....they had not done this since Reconstruction.  Huge voter turnout. 

Charles Lindbergh flight, housing growth, credit buying, raise in standard of living, 19th amendment

1929:  BEGINNING OF THE GREAT DEPRESSION:  Started with the collapse of the Stock Market in October, 1929.  Investors lost life savings.  Hoover received much of the blame but he was not responsible for its start:  the American economy had collapsed; Nothing that Hoover tried to end the depression would work.  Americans elected FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT in 1932, a Democrat. 

ELECTION OF 1932:  Roosevelt (FDR) elected overwhelmingly carrying 42 of 48 states, 89% of the electoral vote and democrats gained a majority in both houses of Congress.  FDR said "Happy Days Are Here Again" which was a popular campaign song.

Roosevelt's plan for ending the depression was known as THE NEW DEAL.  The first thing he did as part of this was to declare a Banking Holiday in which all banks were closed to assess their assets.  Many interesting and new initiatives were part of his New Deal, many which still exist today:  Example:  FDIC, SOCIAL SECURITY, TENNESSEE VALLEY AUTHORITY, BOULDER DAM, GRAND COULEE DAM

ELECTION OF 1936:  FDR re-elected by landslide, defeating Alfred Landon of Kansas

Supreme Court did not support many of FDR's initiative, striking them down as unconstitutional, resulting in FDR attempting to reform the Supreme Court, one of his worst mistakes.  He was attempting to get justices who would support his new programs. 

Another economic downturn in 1937 also weakened FDR's popularity.

I MUST EMPHASIZE THAT FDR'S NEW DEAL NEVER ENDED THE GREAT DEPRESSION and by 1939, the New Deal was dead.  It is said that FDR went too far to the LEFT ideologically. 

While the world was dealing with economic depression in the 1930s, totalitarian governments were rising in Europe and Asia:  Hitler and the Nazis in Germany, Mussolini and the Fascists in Italy, and a military government in Japan. 

A strong ISOLATIONIST attitude existed in the United States following World War I and continued into the 1930s.  This will affect how the United States responded to events involving these totalitarian governments in the 1930s.
EXAMPLES:  Japan seized Manchuria in northeastern China in 1931 and invaded more of China in 1937 and sank the USS Panay, killing 2 Americans.  In 1935, Benito Mussolini attacked Ethiopia and captured it in 1936.  Adolph Hiter, who had become Chancellor of Germany in 1933, ordered German troops to move into the Rhineland, a part of Germany, and this was in direct violation of the Treaty of Versailles and sent German troops to assist the Fascist, Francisco Franco, in overthrowing the government of Spain. 

FDR realized that the U.S. needed to be involved in international affairs.  He attempted to establish warmer relations with the Soviet Union by recognizing  them in 1933.

WORLD WAR II
Officially stared on September 1, 1939 when Hitler invaded Poland.  The United States declared our neutrality.  The United States will clearly support Great Britain against Germany, Italy, and Japan, known as the Axis powers.  The United States will not enter the war until after the Japanese attack teh United States at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on December 7, 1941.