apwh ww2 - key terms

Nevillle Chamberlain

British Prime Minister before Churchill

Appeasement

Satisfying the demands of dissatisfied powers in an effort to maintain peace and stability.

Anschluss

Union of Germany and Austria in 1933

Rhineland and Sudetenland

A region in Germany designated a demilitarized zone by the Treaty of Versailles; Hitler violated the treaty and sent German troops there in 1936; an area in western Czechoslovakia that was coveted by Hitler

Total War

A conflict in which the participating countries devote all their resources to the war effort

Blitzkreig

"lightning war" \= a military tactic designed to create disorganization among enemy forces through the use of mobile forces and locally concentrated firepower.

Blitzkrieg Technology

rapid tanks, mechanized infantry, massive air support + meth

German-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact

The non-aggression pact was an agreement between Hitler and Stalin not to attack each other. This allowed for German victories in the west without worries of the east.

Vichy France

Southern Pro-Nazi French; govern themselves as loyal to nazis; traitors to the Free French in N. France

Charles DeGaulle (WWII)

-French General and leader of the free French in WWII
-His political ideology "Gaullism" was a major influence in French politics
-He criticized the reliance on the Maginot line

Battle of Britain

A series of battles between German and British air forces, fought over Britain in 1940-1941

Radar towers

Technology that helped the British detect incoming German invasions

Winston Churchill

Prime Minister of Great Britain during WWII

Operation Barbarossa

Hitler's plan to invade the Soviet Union thru Poland

Battle of Leningrad

Was a three year siege. 660,000 Soviets died of starvation and disease before Germans retreated. The battle was significant for the bravery of the Soviets against the Germans.

Battle of Stalingrad

Unsuccessful German attack on the city of Stalingrad during World War II from 1942 to 1943, that was the furthest extent of German advance into the Soviet Union.

Lend-Lease Act

1941 law that authorized the president to aid any nation whose defense he believed was vital to American security

Pearl Harbor Attack

Japanese attacked US fleet in Hawaii causing USA to enter WW2

Island Hopping

A military strategy used during World War II that involved selectively attacking specific enemy-held islands and bypassing others

Manhattan Project

code name for the secret United States project set up in 1942 to develop atomic bombs for use in World War II

Hiroshima and Nagasaki

Two Japanese cities on which the U.S. dropped the atomic bombs to end World War II.

D-Day

June 6, 1944 - Led by Eisenhower, over a million troops (the largest invasion force in history) stormed the beaches at Normandy and began the process of re-taking France. The turning point of World War II.

German SS

considered itself the elite of the Nazi soldiers. It assumed sole responsibility for running the concentration camps and organized the holocaust.

Holocaust

the Nazi program of exterminating Jews under Hitler

Nuremberg Laws

1935 laws defining the status of Jews and withdrawing citizenship from persons of non-German blood.

Kristallnacht

(Night of the Broken Glass) November 9, 1938, when mobs throughout Germany destroyed Jewish property and terrorized Jews.

Wannsee Conference

1942 conference in Germany concerning the plan to murder European Jews

Final Solution

Hitler's program of systematically killing the entire Jewish people

Concentration Camps

prison camps used under the rule of Hitler in Nazi Germany. Conditions were inhuman, and prisoners, mostly Jewish people, were generally starved or worked to death, or killed immediately.

Yalta Conference

1945 Meeting with US president FDR, British Prime Minister(PM) Winston Churchill, and and Soviet Leader Stalin during WWII to plan for post-war

Potsdam Conference

July 26, 1945 - Allied leaders Truman, Stalin and Churchill met in Germany to set up zones of control and to inform the Japanese that if they refused to surrender at once, they would face total destruction.

United Nations (UN)

an organization of independent states formed in 1945 to promote international peace and security

Nuremberg Trials

A series of court proceedings held in Nuremberg, Germany, after World War II, in which Nazi leaders were tried for aggression, violations of the rules of war, and crimes against humanity.

Tokyo Trials

war crime trials for Japanese officials

Iron Curtain

A political barrier that isolated the peoples of Eastern Europe after WWII, restricting their ability to travel outside the region

Truman Doctrine

1947, President Truman's policy of providing economic and military aid to any country threatened by communism or totalitarian ideology, mainly helped Greece and Turkey

Marshall Plan

A United States program of economic aid for the reconstruction of Europe (1948-1952)

Containment

American policy of resisting further expansion of communism around the world

Berlin Blockade

Soviet blocking of Berlin from allies; Causing the Berlin Airlift

Berlin Airlift

airlift in 1948 that supplied food and fuel to citizens of west Berlin when the Russians closed off land access to Berlin

NATO

North Atlantic Treaty Organization; an alliance made to defend one another if they were attacked by any other country; US, England, France, Canada, Western European countries

Warsaw Pact

An alliance between the Soviet Union and other Eastern European nations. This was in response to the NATO