World War II Battles, Strategies, Policies, and Key Events

Battle of Midway

A 1942 naval battle marking Japan's first major defeat. The U.S. victory shifted the balance of power in the Pacific

The Big Three

The Allied leaders (Franklin Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and Joseph Stalin) who coordinated military strategy and postwar planning during World War II

Italy

After securing North Africa, Churchill urged invading this country as the next step, believing it was the "soft underbelly" of Europe

Battle of Britain

A campaign of German bombing raids over Britain in 1940 intended to force surrender

Executive Order 9066

Roosevelt's 1942 order used by the army as justification for the forced relocation and internment of Japanese Americans from the West Coast

D-Day

The massive Allied amphibious assault on Normandy on June 6, 1944, which opened a western front and began the liberation of France

Blitzkrieg

Germany's fast, coordinated "lightning war" strategy, combining tanks, infantry, and aircraft to overwhelm opponents quickly, used in early victories including Poland and France

Germany First

The Allied strategy prioritizing the defeat of Germany before Japan, based on the belief that Germany posed the greater long-term threat

Manhattan Project

The secret U.S. program that developed the atomic bomb, employing thousands of workers and scientists at multiple sites, including Los Alamos

Neutrality Acts

Laws aimed at preventing another entanglement in foreign wars by banning arms sales, loans, and travel on belligerent nations' ships

Office of Price Administration

A wartime agency that controlled prices and rationed essential goods to fight inflation

Battle of the Bulge

Germany's failed 1944-45 offensive, exhausting its resources and ending its ability to launch major attacks

Holocaust

Nazi Germany's systematic imprisonment, forced labor, and extermination of Jews and other targeted groups in concentration and death camps

Island Hopping

The U.S. strategy of capturing key islands while bypassing heavily fortified Japanese positions, allowing Allied forces to move closer to Japan

Potsdam Conference

The decision to divide Germany and Austria into four occupation zones controlled by Britain, France, the U.S., and the Soviet Union

Bataan Death March

A deadly forced march of American and Filipino prisoners after Japan captured the Philippines in 1942. Thousands died from starvation, beatings, and exhaustion

Atlantic Charter

The 1941 joint statement by Roosevelt and Churchill supporting self-determination, free trade, freedom of the seas, and no territorial expansion

United Nations

The international body created in 1945 to replace the League of Nations and promote peace, diplomacy, and collective security

Munich Pact

A 1938 agreement in which Britain and France allowed Hitler to occupy the Sudetenland and parts of Czechoslovakia, hoping appeasement would prevent further aggression

Cash and Carry

A 1939 policy allowing the sale of war goods to Britain and France if paid for upfront and transported on their own ships

Pearl Harbor

The U.S. naval base attacked by Japan on December 7, 1941 that destroyed U.S. battleships and brought the United States fully into WWII