Module 4 -- US HIST 142

Neutrality Acts of 1935

Prohibited American manufacturers from selling weapons to nations at war and banned citizens from traveling on ships owned by belligerents.

The Neutrality Act of 1937

allowed the president to sell non military goods to warring nations on a “cash-and-carry basis” - that is, a nation would have to pay cash and then transport US made goods in its own ships.

Axis Alliance

Japan, Germany, and Italy

Munich Conference, 1938

Leaders from Britain, France, Italy, and Germany, came together to discuss what to do with Hitler and the Sudetenland.

Munich Pact, September 30, 1938

All signed an agreement that transferred the Sudetenland to Germany as long as Hitler promised it was the last territory he was interested in conquering.

Neutrality Act of 1939

Lifted the arms embargo and put all trade with warring nations under the terms of “cash-and-carry.”

Blitzkrieg

Lightning War

Manhattan Project

created with the help of Albert Einstein to create a weapon that combated a feared German secret weapon

The Atlantic Charter (1941)

August 1941: Roosevelt and Churchill met on a warship to create a joint statement of “common principles.” Agreement was to pledge that after the “final destruction of the Nazi tyranny” the victors would promote self-determination of all peoples, economic cooperation, freedom of the seas, and a multinational system of international security to be called the United Nations.

Export Control Act, July 2, 1940

authorized President Roosevelt to restrict the export of military supplies and other strategic materials crucial to Japan.

Tripartite Pact (1940)

September 27, 1940: Japanese government signed a Tripartite Pact with Nazi Germany which pledged to declare war on any nation that attacked any of them

Lend-Lease Act (1941)

Allowed the president to lend or lease military equipment to “any country whose defense the President deems vital to the defense of the United States”

War Powers Act (Dec 18, 1941)

Gave the President far-reaching authority to reorganize government agencies and create new ones, regular business and industry, and even censor mail and other forms of communication.

War production Board (1942)

Roosevelt directed the conversion of industries to war production

- 1945: plants in the United States, many running 24/7, produced 300,000 warplanes, 89,000 tanks, 3 million machine guns, and 7 million rifles.

Revenue Act of 1942 (victory tax)

requires most workers to begin paying taxes

Emergency Farm Labor Programs (1942)

“Bracero Program” Mexico agreed to provide 168,000 seasonal farmworkers, on year-long contracts between 1942-1945

Zoot Suit Riots

thousands of off-duty sailors and soldiers joined angry Whites and rampaged Los Angeles assaulting Latinos, African Americans, and Filipinos.

“Code Talkers”

Use of Navajo to help create an unbreakable code

“War Relocation Camps”

Western states, forced removal of more than 120,000 Nisei from their homes, about 80,000 who were US citizens.

Executive Order 9066

February 19, 1942. Roosevelt signed to create these internment camps

Operation Torch (November 8, 1942)

100,000 American and British troops landed in Morocco and Algeria led by US General Dwight D. Eisenhower

The Casablanca conference (1943)

Roosevelt announced with Churchill’s blessing that the war would end only with the “unconditional surrender” of all enemy nations

Tehran Conference (1943)

Agreed on the creation of an international peacekeeping organization: The United Nations

Operation Overlord

planned assault on the Atlantic Wall surrounding the French coastline

D-Day

June 6, 1944: “Operation Overlord” put into effect

Success as it will catch the Germans by surprise

Landings on Normandy with the largest fleet in history

Liberation of Paris

August 25, 1944: Paris is liberated from the Nazis

Battle of the Bulge

Mid-December 1944: As Allies were closing in on Germany’s Western border, Hitler sprang a surprise attack

Effects: Germans lost more than 100,000 men ~ killed, wounded or captured, Americans lost more than 89,000 men

The Yalta Conference (1945)

Agreed that once Germany surrendered, the Soviets would occupy eastern Germany, and the American/British would control Western Germany and that Berlin would be split between as an occupied zone

The Holocaust

Reports of genocidal killings of Jews came out as early as 1942 “Final Solution”: Systematic killing of Jews Approx, 6 million Jews and more non-Jewish peoples were killed The War Refugee Board, 1944: Roosevelt urged by this wife to create a program to rescue European Jews at the risk of extermination

Coral Sea

US warplanes forced a Japanese invasion fleet headed toward New Guinea to turn back after sinking an aircraft carrier and destroying seventy planes

Midway

First major defeat of the Japanese in the Pacific

Island-Hopping

liberating most important islands, leaving isolated Japanese bases

Operation Downfall

the plan to invade Japan

The Atomic Bomb

Hiroshima and Nagasaki

Potsdam Declaration

demanded that Japan surrender by August 3rd or face “prompt and utter destruction”

Truman Doctrine

President Truman asked Congress for $400 million to assist Greece and Turkey.

“domino theory”

one country falls to Communism, they will all fall

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)

largest defensive alliance in the world, declared that an attack against any of the members would be an attack against all

National Security Act (1947)

Centralized control of the military establishment ~ creating a Department of Defense to oversee the three military branches - the army,

navy, air force - also supplied a group of government top specialists on

international relations to advise the President

Balfour Declaration

United Nations voted to divide (partition) Palestine into separate Jewish and Arab states

Employment Act of 1946

Congress approved and authorized the federal government “to promote maximum employment, production, and purchasing power”

Servicemen's’ Readjustment Act of 1944

GI Bill: Helped transition veterans back into civilian life

Taft-Hartley Labor Act (1947)

Republicans in Congress wanted to curb the power of the unions

NSC-68

report endorsed the containment policy

House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC)

had claimed that communists had infiltrated the federal government

Dr. Hector Perez Garcia

US Army Major, organized the American GI Forum in Texas in 1948

“Operation Wetback” (1954)

Goal was to utilize the federal government and military to find illegal immigrants and deport undocumented Mexicans

The Green Book

a book that was published for African Americans to identify the businesses, motels, and restaurants that served African Americans

Brown v. Board of Education (1952)

Topeka, Kansas. Court declared in 1954 that “in the field of public education the doctrine of ‘separate but equal’ has no place”. Integration in education was to be the standard going forward.

The Montgomery Bus Boycott

African American leaders met to organize a long-planned boycott of the city’s bus system ~ the most frequent bus riders were African American ~ Montgomery Bus Boycott

Civil Rights Act of 1957

Bill was intended to ensure that all Americans regardless of race or ethnicity, were allowed to vote.

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

Christian faith was the bedrock of the early civil rights movement

The Eisenhower Doctrine, 1958

Congress approved, promised to extend economic and military aid to Arab nations and to use armed force if necessary to assist any such nation against Communist aggression

Federal-Aid Highway Act (1956)

created a network of interstate highways modeled after the German autobahn (limited-access national highways) to serve the needs of commerce and defense, as well as the public

GI Bill

Servicemen’s Readjustment Act: (GI BIll of Rights (GI = Government Issue)): bill included unemployment pay for one year, preference to those applying for federal government jobs, loans for home construction or starting a business, access to government hospitals, and generous subsidies for education

Bay of Pigs

Launched invasion of trained men on Cuba

Cuban Missile Crisis

Khrushchev approved the secret installation of 160 Soviet missiles on the island nation of Cuba along with some 40,000 Soviet troops Soviets felt justified to in doing so because of the Bay of Pigs invasion, also that the United States had ordered US missiles with nuclear warheads to be installed along the Soviet border in Turkey

Limited Nuclear test ban treaty.

Banned the testing of nuclear weapons in the atmosphere.

Kennedy’s Assassination

in Texas by Lee Harvey Oswald, a 24 year old ex-Marine turned Communist

Sit-ins

White waitress refused to serve them, they had to eat standing or take their food outside, returned the next day with two dozen more students sitting for hours waiting be served, returned every day for a week

Birmingham

MLK would be arrested and several white ministers ~ from his jail cell MLK would write “Letter from Birmingham Jail” a defense of nonviolent civil disobedience

“I have a f