WORLD WAR 2

1919–1923: The Post–World War I Settlement

Treaty of Versailles

__________The peace treaty ending WWI imposed massive burdens on Germany. It lost about 13% of its territory (Alsace-Lorraine returned to France, the Polish Corridor created, colonies seized),

• its army was limited to 100,000 men, it was banned from having an air force, and it was required to pay heavy reparations.

• These terms deeply humiliated Germans. Nationalists branded the treaty a “Diktat” (dictated peace).

• Versailles did not destroy Germany’s capacity forever but created bitterness that extremists like Hitler exploited in the 1930s.

League of Nations

Intended to enforce peace through collective security, the League depended on cooperation of major powers.

• But the U.S. Senate refused to join, weakening credibility from the start. Without American involvement and with no military power of its own,

• The League often issued condemnations but could not stop aggression. Its failures in the 1930s convinced dictators they could act with impunity.

1. Ruhr Crisis and Hyperinflation in Germany

2. Beer Hall Putsch

1. France and Belgium occupied the Ruhr (Germany’s industrial heartland) when reparations weren’t paid

2. Hitler’s early coup attempt, the _________(1923), though it failed, showed how economic chaos fueled radicalism.

1929–1932: The Great Depression & Japanese Expansion

1. Wall Street Crash

2. Mukden Incident (Manchurian Crisis)

1. __________The U.S. stock market collapsed, plunging the world into economic depression. International trade shrank, unemployment skyrocketed, and governments struggled to respond

2. ___________Japanese soldiers staged an explosion on a railway line in Manchuria and blamed it on Chinese forces, using it as an excuse to invade.

   • When the League condemned Japan through the Lytton Report, Japan simply quit the League. The lack of consequences showed aggressors that international law could be ignored.

1933–1935: Hitler Consolidates Power and Begins Defiance

(1)30 January 1933 Hitler becomes Chancellor of Germany

1. Chancellor

2. Fuhrer

(2) Germany withdraws from the League of Nations

At first he becomes a 1. _________ through Press. Hindenburgs and. Within months, the Reichstag Fire (Feb 1933) gave him pretext to crush opposition. By August 1934, after President Hindenburg’s death, Hitler became 2. ___________

(3)Hitler announces conscription and rearmament

(4) Anglo-German Naval Agreement

3. _____________Germany openly violated Versailles by rearming. The Luftwaffe (air force) was unveiled, and conscription restored the army.France and Britain protested but did not act militarily. This was a crucial moment of appeasement — Hitler learned that the Allies would not stop him from breaking treaties.

4. Britain allowed Germany to build a navy up to 35% of Britain’s fleet. By striking a bilateral deal,

   • Britain undermined Versailles and bypassed France and Italy.

   • To Hitler, it suggested Britain might tolerate German rearmament.

(5) Italy invades Ethiopia

Mussolini sought a colonial empire and attacked ___________. The League imposed sanctions, but they were half-hearted (e.g., oil was excluded). This destroyed confidence in the League and pushed Mussolini toward Hitler, since Britain and France had alienated him.

1936: Escalation and Testing Limits

(1) Remilitarization of the Rhineland

1. Rhineland

1. Hitler sent troops into the __________, a zone that Versailles had demilitarized.

• German generals were nervous — if France had resisted, they would have retreated.

• But France did nothing, and Britain saw it as Germany marching “into its own backyard.” This was a major turning point.

• Hitler gambled and won, and his prestige skyrocketed. The failure to oppose him directly encouraged even bolder moves.

(2) Spanish Civil War begins July 1936

1. left-wing Republicans and right-wing Nationalists

A war between __________ and ____________. Germany and Italy supported General Franco with troops, aircraft, and weapons. The USSR backed the Republicans.

• The war became a rehearsal for WWII. Germany tested Blitzkrieg tactics and dive-bombing (e.g., the bombing of Guernica). Italy and Germany grew closer through shared involvement.

(3) Rome-Berlin Axis announced

Mussolini and Hitler declared their partnership. Europe was increasingly polarized: democracies vs. fascist powers.

Anti-Comintern Pact

_____________Germany and Japan pledged to oppose communism (implicitly against the Soviet Union). Italy joined in 1937. The Axis alliance was beginning to form, linking Europe and Asia in anti-democratic, expansionist cooperation.

1937: Japan Expands Further

1. Marco Polo Bridge Incident

2. Nanjing Massacre

1. __________A skirmish between Japanese and Chinese troops escalated into full-scale war. Japan invaded northern and eastern China. This marked the beginning of the Second Sino-Japanese War, a brutal conflict that tied Japan’s fate to militarism.

2. __________Japanese forces captured Nanjing, committing atrocities against civilians and prisoners of war. Estimates range from 200,000 to 300,000 killed.

1. Anschluss (Annexation of Austria)

2. Munich Agreement

1. ______________German troops marched into Austria to cheering crowds. A manipulated referendum showed 99% approval.

• The annexation violated Versailles and the Treaty of St. Germain, but Britain and France again did nothing. Hitler gained Austria’s resources and manpower, boosting his military strength.

2. __________Hitler demanded the Sudetenland,

   • a German-speaking region of Czechoslovakia.

   • Britain’s Neville Chamberlain and France’s Édouard Daladier agreed to give it to him in exchange for promises of “no further territorial demands.”

   • Chamberlain returned declaring “peace for our time.” But to Hitler, appeasement proved the Allies lacked resolve. For Czechoslovakia, Munich was a betrayal.

Germany occupies the rest of Czechoslovakia

Hitler broke his Munich promise and seized Prague.

• This was not about unifying Germans — it was conquest.

• Britain and France finally realized Hitler’s ambitions were unlimited. They guaranteed Poland’s independence. Appeasement collapsed.

ANLALA HAHAHAHAHAH

Pact of Steel

__________Germany and Italy signed a formal military alliance, pledging to support each other in war. Cemented the Axis Powers in Europe.

Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact

___________Germany and the Soviet Union signed a non-aggression pact. Secretly, they agreed to divide Poland and Eastern Europe between them. This shocked the world. Hitler neutralized the Soviet threat of a two-front war, clearing the way to invade Poland.

Germany Invades Poland

Using Blitzkrieg tactics, German forces smashed into _________from the west. Britain and France issued ultimatums for Germany to withdraw. When Hitler ignored them, war became unavoidable.

Axis Powers

1. Germany (Nazi Germany)

   • Adolf Hitler (Führer).

   • Nazism fused aggressive nationalism, racial ideology (antisemitism, anti-Slavic racism), anti-communism, and authoritarianism.

   • Strategic aims:

     1. Overturn Versailles,

     2. reunify Germanic peoples,

     3. acquire Lebensraum (living space)

     4. defeat Bolshevism.

2. Italy (Fascist Italy)

   • Benito Mussolini (Il Duce).

   • Fascism emphasized authoritarian nationalism, corporatism, and empire.

• Strategic aims:

  1. Restore Italy’s “Roman” prestige via colonial expansion (Africa, Balkans) and alliance with Germany.

3. Japan (Empire of Japan)

   • Emperor Hirohito with contested level of direct involvement);

   • Prime Minister/General Hideki Tojo was a major wartime leader.

   Strategic aims: Secure resources and markets in Asia

Allied Powers

1. Britain

   • Neville Chamberlain (until 1940), Winston Churchill (from May 1940).

   • Objectives: Defend the British Isles and Empire, resist German/Axis aggression, and later defeat Axis powers globally.

2. Soviet Union

   • Joseph Stalin.

   • Objectives: Survive Nazi invasion and secure a buffer zone in Eastern Europe; protect the socialist state.

3. United States

   • Leadership: Franklin D. Roosevelt (until 1945), Harry Truman (from April 1945).

   • Entry & role: Entered war after Pearl Harbor (Dec 7, 1941). Provided decisive industrial output, financial support

Allied powers

4. China (Republic of China)

   • Leadership: Chiang Kai-shek (Nationalists);

   • Mao Zedong led Communist forces (both fought Japan, but were internally divided).

• Role: Fought Japanese invasion since 1937 (Second Sino-Japanese War)

5. France

   • After defeat (1940), Vichy France collaborated with Germany while Free French forces under Charles de Gaulle fought from abroad.

ANGLO-POLISH AGREEMENT

On the 25th of August, two days after the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, Britain and Poland signed an agreement for mutual assistance. The agreement contained promises of mutual assistance between the nations if either was attacked.

Invasion of Poland

1. The Gleiwitz Incident

1, __________on the night of August 31, 1939. The Nazis initiated a campaign designed to persuade the international community that Germany was a victim of Polish aggression and that German Nationals living in Poland had been subject to torture.

• Gleiwitz radio station (known as a hub for the dissemination of German Propaganda) disguised as Polish insurgents bringing with them Polish prisoners called “canned goods” to be murdered and used as bodies for the staging of a fight.

PHONEY WAR

Before that, there was an eight month long period of Idling between Germany and the Allies Called the Phoney War. During this period France and Germany played defensively and used the time for rearmament.

• Though no major military actions occurred during the Phoney War, the allies did implement economic warfare by establishing a naval blockade similar to the one in the first world war, later it would soon prove ineffective due to Germany just getting resources from the Soviets in the East

Vichy France

In place rose Vichy France, an authoritarian state where Petain was its head. The French slogan, “Liberty, equality, fraternity” was replaced with “Work, family, fatherland.”

• Pierre Laval, pushed the National Assembly to dissolve itself bringing the Third Republic to an end as he believed a legal government would secure France’s future under German domination.

TRIPARTITE PACT

_____________A month and a half later on September 27, 1940, the Axis powers were formed as Germany, Italy and Japan became allies with the signing of the Tripartite Pact in Berlin. The Pact provided for mutual assistance should any of the signatories suffer attack by any nation not already involved in the war.

• This formalization of the alliance was aimed directly at “neutral” America—designed to force the United States to think twice before venturing in on the side of the Allies.

Meiji Restoration

the Tokugawa shōgun, who ruled Japan in the feudal period, lost his power and the emperor was restored to the supreme position. The emperor Emperor Mutsuhito took the name Meiji ("enlightened rule") as his reign name; this event was known as the_________

FIRST SINO-JAPANESE WAR

1. Treaty of Shimonoseki

1. The First Sino-Japanese War was a conflict between China and Japan. The immediate cause of the war was the dispute over control of Korea. Both China and Japan had long been interested in the peninsula, which was seen as a valuable strategic location. On April 17, 1895, Japan and China signed the 1.____________, which formally ended the war.

Japan in World War 1

In 1914, the British government asked Japan to help destroy German armored cruisers in Chinese waters. At the time, Japan was allied with Great Britain (the Anglo-Japanese Alliance in 1902), but the operative scope of the alliance was limited to East Asia, so Japan was not obligated to enter the war. However, Foreign Minister Kato Takaaki (1860-1926) favored entering the war to pursue Japan’s national interests.

Japan took control of the German Pacific Islands such as the Marshall, Mariana, and the Caroline Islands

• These Islands were controlled by Japan through the Class C mandate given by the League of Nations.

Japan’s invasion of Manchuria

Japan staged an explosion on a Japanese-owned South Manchuria Railway near the city of Mukden, Manchuria, in northeastern China, to serve as a pretext for a full-scale invasion.

• The League of Nations created a commission of inquiry, widely referred to as the Lytton Commission. The Lytton Commission was tasked to investigate the Japanese invasion of Manchuria and to create a report. The League of Nations released the

• Lytton Report which stated that both Chinese nationalism and Japanese militarism are responsible for the escalating crisis.

• Give back Manchuria to china

Japan’s Attack on Pearl Harbor

On December 7, 1941, Japan attacked ___________ which aimed at destroying the Pacific Fleet of the U.S. That way, the Americans would not be able to fight back as Japan’s armed forces spread across the South Pacific.

• How did the U.S. respond to the attack on Pearl Harbor?

  • President Franklin D. Roosevelt addressed Congress, asking them to declare war on Japan. It was approved and the U.S. declared war on Japan.

Battle of Midway

On June 4, 1942, _____________—one of the most decisive U.S. victories against Japan during World War II—began.

• the outnumbered U.S. Pacific Fleet succeeded in destroying four Japanese aircraft carriers while losing only one of its own, the Yorktown, to the previously invincible Japanese navy.

Atomic Bombing of Hiroshima (Little Boy) and Nagasaki (Fat Man)

On August 6, 1945, during World War II (1939-45), an American B-29 bomber dropped the world’s first deployed atomic bomb over the Japanese city of Hiroshima. Three days later, a second B-29 dropped another A-bomb on Nagasaki, killing an estimated 40,000 people.

Italian Campaign

The Italian campaign was the Allied invasion of Italy that commenced after the victory in North Africa (Operation Torch) and Sicily (Operation Husky). It was a long, brutal, and costly effort to defeat Axis forces in Italy, with the goal of removing Italy from the war and tying down German troops to prevent them from reinforcing other fronts

• This was against what Winston Churchill had hoped. Naming the once “soft underbelly of Europe” as a “Old tough gut”

End of war in the europe
Yalta Conference

The aim of the ___________ was to decide what to do with Germany once it had been defeated and to discuss the final stages of the war against Germany and Japan and the postwar world order, they discussed postwar matters mainly the following:

1. Germany Split into 4 occupation zones

2. The fate of Eastern Europe and of Poland

3. Establishment of the United Nations

High-level Conferences that convened The Big 3

1. Tehran Conference (‘eureka’) at Tehran, Iran [ November 1943 ]

• a. Strategies to defeat Nazi Germany

• b. “Operation Overlord”: Invasion of Normandy set in June 1944 as an attempt to open a second front of the war against Nazi c. Germany.

2. The Yalta Conference (Crimea Conference) at Yalta , Crimea [ February 1945 ]

• a. France and Belgium at this point has been liberated from Nazi occupation

• b. German defeat was near

3. Potsdam Conference at Potsdam in the Soviet occupation zone [July 1945]

• a. The final conference, which occurred shortly after Germany's surrender, focused on the terms of occupation for Germany and the implementation of post-war policies in Europe.

The Big 3 or “The Grand Alliance”

Formed Allies:

• United States

• United Kingdom

• Soviet Union

Atomic Bombs Dropped on Japan

• US Pres. Harry Trauman

Upon the death of President Roosevelt on April 12th, 1945, it was left to President _____________ to decide how to end the war.

• Upon becoming President, Harry Truman was informed of the Manhattan Project, a top secret government funded research to produce the first atomic bombs

• Truman would issue the Potsdam Declaration which demanded the surrender of the Japanese, within he warned of “prompt and utter destruction.” After eleven days with no reply, an American bomber ( the Enola Gay ) was on its way towards Japan.

1. Important neutrals & shifting alignments

2. How the powers interacted (alliances, pacts, cooperation)