APUSH Ch 24: World at War 1937-1945 vocab

Facism

Formed as a response to disrupted economic life and collapse of traditional political institutions in Germany, Spain, Italy, and Japan, whose nations instituted a powerful authoritarian militaristic governments

Hitler’s facism

combined centralized authoritarian, doctrine of Aryan racial supremacy, intense nationalism, and a spiritual awakening of Germans

Japan’s motivation for imperialism

wanted raw materials and colonies to become an industrial power (like Britain)

Leader of Italy and why he wanted to expand

Benito Mussolini; wanted overseas power and colonial resources

• invaded Ethiopia, league condemned them but did nothing

Japans invasion of China

Occupied Manchuria, an industrial province, league condemned them but did nothing

Events that led to the rise of Hitler and Nazi party

• WWI reparation payments

• economic depression

• fear of communism

• labor unrest

• rising unemployment

How Hitler gained power

The reichstag (German legislature) gave Hitler dictatorship powers to resolve the economic crisis. Hitler outlawed all other parties, jailed political opponents, and declared himself leader

Mein Kampf (My Struggle)

Included:

• European Domination

• plans to overturn the territorial settlements of the Treaty of Versailles

• Unite Germany and create “Germany Fatherland”

• annex inferior races

lebensraum

a new region in Germany after removing “inferior races” that allowed for settlement, farming, and natural resources

Rome-Berlin Axis

a political and military alliance between Italy, Germany, and Japan against Soviet Union, giving them military advantage

Nye Committee report

a report that said that munition makers coerced Wilson into WWI, caused congress to laws to prevent the nation from being drawn into war

“good war” meaning

American and British leaders saw it as defense against facism

Neutrality Acts of 1935 and 1936

1935: imposed embargo on selling weapons to warring countries and that Americans traveling to hostile nations were at risk

1936: Congress banned loans to belligerent (hostile) countries

1937s “cash and carry”

If warring countries wanted to buy non military goods from the US, they had to pay cash and carry their own ships to avoid naval warfare

Isolationists

Robert Taft; distrusted Roosevelt and European nations

National League of Mothers; anti communism, Christian morality, anti-semitism

Charles Lindbergh

• First man to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean

• Face of the American First Committee to keep the US from joining the war through protests, posters, and brochures

Popular Front

Americans who wanted greater involvement in Europe

• Types of people who joined: American Communist party, African American civil rights activists, trade unionists, left wing writers, intellectuals, New Deal administrators

Munich Conference

Britain and France agree to let Germany seize Sudetenland if he agreed to stop taking territory; he didn’t and war followed

Deal between Hitler and Stalin

signed a mutual non aggression pact that meant that Germany did not have to face war from Britain, France, AND soviet union

Committee to Defend America by Aiding the Allies

interventionists led by William White who wanted to engage with international developments

Destroyers for Bases deal

US gives 50 destroyers to Britain for the right to build military based on British territory

Acts congress approved in 1940

• Peacetime draft

• large increase in defense spending

Four Freedoms speech FDR

spoke of a future world order founded on the essential human freedoms including, freedom of speech, freedom of worship, freedom from want, and freedom from fear.

Lend Lease Act

allowed the president to lease, lend, or dispose of arms and equipment to Britain of any country vital to the safety of the US

Atlantic Charter

• Called for economic cooperation, national self determination, and political stability after the war

• Impact: Basis of American led transatlantic alliance after the war and set up future conflict with Asia and Africa colonies with Europe

Rape of Nanjing

Japan invaded Nanjing, massacred 300,000 chinese residents and raped thousands of women

Hideki Tojo

he occupied the French colony of Indochina and wanted to create a “greater east asia co-prosperity sphere” and match overseas empires of British and US

Pearl Harbor

Japanese bombers killed many Americans in Hawaii and destroyed many war weapons

• United the US against Japan and US joins war

War Powers Act and Imperial Presidency

Gave the president control over all aspects of the war effort; start of a far reaching use (and sometimes abuse) of executive power during late 20th century

Revenue Act of 1942

expanded the # of people paying income tax from 3.9 million to 42.6 million; to pay for the rest of the war

War production Board

awarded defense contracts, allocated scarce resources (rubber, copper, and oil) for military uses, and persuaded businesses to convert to wartime production

Liberty Ships

Henry Z Kaiser used Henry Fords model of mass production on these large ships that carried cargo and troops to the war zone

Military Industrial Complex

The largest corporations produced 70% of the US’s industrial output; complex= the relationship between the military, government, and businesses to increase military production

Code Talkers

Navajo Native Americans intercepted enemy messages and communicated orders in a language no other people could understand

Rosie the Riveter

A symbol for working women during the war; urged women to take jobs in defense industries

Double V Campaign

Called for victory over Nazisim as well as racisism in the US; didn’t make sense that they were fighting for freedom when there was still Jim Crow laws

Philip Randolph

demanded that the government require defense contractors to hire more black workers and suggested a March to Washington

Executive Order 8802

prohibited discrimination in employment of workers in defense industries because if race in response to the march to washington

Fair Employment Practices Commission

• established by the Executive Order 8802; was a federal commitment to black employment rights

• it was limited because it didnt affect segregation in the armed forces, and it couldnt enforce compliance with its orders.

CORE

Congress of Racial Equality, founded by James Farmer. They held direct action protests such as sit-ins.

Bracero Program

To meet wartime labor demands, the US brought tens of thousands of Mexican contract laborers into the US under this program. Braceros highlighted oppressive conditions of farm labor.

National War Labor Board

established wages, hours, and working conditions and had the authority to seize manufacturing plants that didnt comply.

Smith-Connally Labor Act

allowed president to prohibit strikes in defense industries and forbade political contributions by unions.

Second Bill of Rights

proposed by FDR, to guarantee all Americans access to education, jobs, food, clothing, housing, and medicare.

Servicemen’s Readjustment Act (GI Bill)

authorized the government to provide war veterans with funds for education, housing, healthcare, and loans to start businesses/buy homes.

Harry Truman

was chosen as new VP running mate for FDR. after FDR died, he became president.

victory gardens

backyard gardens that produced 40% of the nation’s vegetables

Office of War Information

disseminated news and promoted patriotism

Hollywood and the war effort

producers/actors offered their talents to the War Department. they portrayed heroic American soldiers in films.

rationing

Americans’ food, clothing, etc was regulated/rationed during the war. But some people secretly bought stuff on the black market.

zoot suits

oversized suits of clothing in fashion among young male blacks and Mexicans. they underlined rejection of middle class values.

Zoot suit riot - After a rumor of Mexicans beating a white sailor, whites attacked zoot suiters.

Executive Order 9066

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.

War Relocation Authority

Moved the Japanese prisoners to camps in desolate areas. Ironically the ones in Hawaii, who were closer to Japan, were not imprisoned.

442nd Regimental Combat Unit

Composed almost entirely of Nisei volunteers, served with distinction in Europe.

Hirabayashi v. United States and Korematsu v. United States

in both cases, the Court allowed the removal of Japanese Americans from the West Coast on the basis of “military necessity”

Big Three (Grand Alliance)

• FDR, Winston Churchill, and Joseph Stalin.

• What they agreed to do first: to defeat Germany.

• What they disagreed on: military strategy and timing.

• Stalin wanted to open a second front with a major invasion of Germany through France to relieve pressure on the Soviet Army.

• What was agreed in Tehran: Churchill and FDR agreed to open the second front within 6 months, in return for Stalin’s promise to join the fight against Japan. The long delay angered Stalin.

D-Day

June 6, 1944 - the Allied invasion of northern France. Largest seaborne assault in history. Opened a 2nd front against Germans and moved Allies closer to victory in Europe.

Holocaust

Hitler’s extermination of 6 million Jews + 6 million other “undesirables”.

When it first began, the US refused to let fleeing Jews in.

SS St. Louis

A German ocean liner carrying 1000 Jewish refugees, sought permission from FDR to dock at an American port - FDR refused, and it was forced to return to Europe.

Battle of Bulge

• Germanys final offensive

• American and Britain drove toward Berlin West, while Soviet Union went East

• Hitler commits suicide and Germany surrenders (May 7, 1945)

Final Solution

6 million jews and other undesireables like Poles, Slavs, Gypsies, and homosexuals, killed in Nazi camps

War Refugee Board after the war

helped move 200,000 European Jews to safe havens in other countries

Bataan death march

Forced surrender of US forces in philippines, death of 10,000 American prisoners of war

Battle of Coral Sea

used aircrafts to halt Japanese offensive against Australia (1942)

Battle of Midway

American navy severely damaged the Japanese fleet

Douglas Mac Arthur and Chester Nimitz and strategy

led offensive in the pacific, slowly toward Japan, taking one island after another

Battle of Leyte Gulf

reconquest of the Philippines, Japanese lose almost entire fleet

Kamikaze pilots

Japanese suicide planes flying into US ships

Death of FDR

• April 12, 1945 of cerebral hemorrhage

• Harry Truman becomes president

Manhattan Project

• testing of the Atomic Bomb

• 2 billion $ and hidden from everyone

• General Leslie Graves and Oppenheimer

Los Alamos, New Mexico

where the 1st successful bomb was tested

Hiroshima and Nagasaki

Truman and his advisors bomb Japan believing it’s the only way to get them to surrender

• they surrender 1945 Sept 2

Impact on cities

hundreds of cities bombed and obliterated, Germany and Japans industrial economies in ruin

Impact of the war on Imperialism

Asia and Africa took Atlantic Charter seriously and imperialism was unacceptable

Dwight D Eisenhower

General that led allied troops to defeat German Afrika Corps

Potsdam Conference

Allies decided Japan could only be defeated with unconditional surrender

Gordon Hirabayashi

Among the nisei who actively resisted incarceration. Turned himself into FBI and had US v korematsu and Hirabayashi v US

Executive order of 8802

stopped discrimination of race in defense industries