Ch 23 The World At War

Fascism

An authoritarian system of government characterized by dictatorial rule, extreme nationalism, disdain for civil society, and a conviction that imperialisms and warfare are the principal means by which nations attain greatness. The United States went into war against this when it faced Nazi Germany under Adolf Hitler and Italy under Benito Mussolini during World War II.

National Socialist (Nazi) Party

German political party led by Adolf Hitler, who became chancellor of Germany in 1933. The party's ascent was fueled by huge World War I reparation payments, economic depression, fear of communism, labor unrest, and rising unemployment.

Rome-Berlin Axis

A political and military alliance formed in 1936 between German dictator Adolf Hitler and the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini.

Neutrality Act of 1935

Legislation that sought to avoid entanglement in foreign wars while protecting trade. It imposed an embargo on selling arms to warring countries and declared that Americans traveling on the ships of belligerent nations did so at their own risk.

Popular Front

A small but vocal group of Americans who pushed for greater U.S. involvement in Europe. American Communist Party members, African American civil rights activists, and trade unionists, among other members of the Popular Front coalition, encouraged Roosevelt to take a stronger stand against European fascism.

Munich Conference

A conference in Europe held in September 1938 during which Britain and France agreed to allow Germany to annex the Sudetenland — a German-speaking border area of Czechoslovakia — in return for Hitler's pledge to seek no more territory.

America First Committee

A committee organized by isolationists in 1940 to oppose American entry into World War II. The membership of the committee included senators, journalists, and publishers and such well-respected figures as the aviator Charles Lindbergh.

Four Freedoms

Identified by President Franklin D. Roosevelt as the most basic human rights: freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom from want, and freedom from fear. The president used these ideas of freedom to justify support for England during World War II, which in turn pulled the United States into the war.

Lend-Lease Act

Legislation in 1941 that enabled Britain to obtain arms from the United States without cash but with the promise to reimburse the United States when the war ended. The act reflected Roosevelt's desire to assist the British in any way possible, short of war.

Atlantic Charter

A press release by President Roosevelt and British prime minister Winston Churchill in August 1941 calling for economic cooperation, national self-determination, and guarantees of political stability after the war.

War Powers Act

The law that gave President Roosevelt unprecedented control over all aspects of the war effort during World War II.

Revenue Act

A 1942 act that expanded the number of people paying income taxes from 3.9 million to 42.6 million. These taxes on personal incomes and business profits paid half the cost of World War II.

Code Talkers

Native American soldiers trained to use native languages to send messages in battle during World War II. Neither the Japanese nor the Germans could decipher the codes used by these Navajo, Comanche, Choctaw, and Cherokee speakers, and the messages they sent gave the Allies great advantage in the battle of Iwo Jima, among many others.

Executive Order 8802

An order signed by President Roosevelt in 1941 that prohibited "discrimination in the employment of workers in defense industries or government because of race, creed, color, or national origin" and established the Fair Employment Practices Commission (FEPC).

Bracero Program

Officially the Mexican Farm Labor Agreement(signed with Mexico), a federal program that brought hundreds of thousands of Mexican agricultural workers to the United States during and after World War II. The program continued until 1964 and was a major spur of Mexican immigration to the United States.

Serviceman's Readjustment Act

Popularly known as the GI Bill, 1944 legislation authorizing the government to provide World War II veterans with funds for education, housing, and health care, as well as loans to start businesses and buy homes.

Zoot Suit Riots

In June 1943, a group of white sailors and soldiers in Los Angeles, seeking revenge for an earlier skirmish with Mexican American youths, attacked anyone they found wearing this type of clothing.

Executive Order 9066

An order signed by President Roosevelt in 1942 that authorized the War Department to force Japanese Americans from their West Coast homes and hold them in relocation camps for the rest of the war.

D-Day

June 6, 1944, the date of the Allied invasion of northern France. It was the largest amphibious assault in world history. The invasion opened a second front against the Germans and moved the Allies closer to victory in Europe.

Holocaust

Germany's campaign during World War II to exterminate all Jews living in German-controlled lands, along with other groups the Nazis deemed "undesirable." In all, some 11 million people were killed, most of them Jews

Manhattan Project

Top-secret project authorized by Franklin Roosevelt in 1942 to develop an atomic bomb ahead of the Germans. The Americans who worked on the project at Los Alamos, New Mexico (among other highly secretive sites around the country), succeeded in producing a successful atomic bomb by July 1945.

Korematsu v. US

1944 Supreme Court case in which the Supreme Court upheld the order providing for the relocation of Japanese Americans. It was not until 1988 that Congress formally apologized and agreed to pay $20,000 to each survivor

Double Victory Campaign

Victory over fascism abroad, and victory over discrimination at home. Large numbers of African-Americans migrated from poor Southern farms to munitions centers. Racial tensions were high in overcrowded cities like Chicago; Detroit and Harlem experienced race riots in 1943.

Non-Aggression Pact

Germany and Russia agreed not to attack each other, which allowed Hitler to open up a second front in the West without worrying about defending against Russia.

Tehran Conference

A meeting between FDR, Churchill and Stalin in Iran to discuss coordination of military efforts against Germany, they repeated the pledge made in the earlier Moscow Conference to create the United Nations after the war's conclusion to help ensure international peace.

Women's Army Corps

Over 150,000 served in this capacity either as nurses or clerks, fulfilling vital communication and record-keeping services. Few will remain in the Army after the war due female slots being cut.

General Douglas MacArthur

Military governor of the Philippines, which Japan invaded a few days after the Pearl Harbor attack. He escaped to Australia in March 1942 and was appointed supreme commander of the Allied forces in the Pacific.

General Dwight D. Eisenhower

Served as the supreme commander of the western Allied forces and became chief of staff in 1941. Sent to Great Britain in 1942 as the U.S. commander in Europe.

Battle of the Bulge

After recapturing France, the Allied advance became stalled along the German border. In the winter of 1944, Germany staged a massive counterattack in Belgium and Luxembourg which pushed 30 miles into the Allied lines. The Allies stopped the German advance and threw them back across the Rhine with heavy losses.

Battle of Okinawa

The U.S. had been pursuing an "island-hopping" campaign, moving north from Australia towards Japan. They invaded this island on April 1, 1945, only 300 miles south of the Japanese home islands. By the time the fighting ended on June 2, 1945, the U.S. had lost 50,000 men and the Japanese 100,000.