Lebensborn
permitted & encouraged relations of suitable girls with SS men for stock rearing (Aryan-breeding program)
SS
elite corps of the Nazis (guards detachment: personal guards to Hitler)
The Final Solution
the Nazi plan, under the direction of Himmler, for the elimination of European Jews
Charles de Gaulle
French general during WWII - organized the Free French movement
Heinrich Himmler
Nazi leader - oversaw the program of systematic genocide
Joseph Goebbels
Nazi leader and politician - became Hitler’s Minister of Propaganda
Winston Churchill
part of his contribution to victory was to maintain British morale – after victory in the war, he was defeated in the general election
Totalitarianism
applied both to fascist & communist governments
Facism
an ultra-nationalistic & anti-communist ideology - the state runs the economy
under fascism:
private property is not abolished – the state does not own all property
Adolf Hitler’s Background
born in Austria - rejected by the Vienna Academy of Arts
Nazi Outlook:
Germans were entitled to conquer/subjugate other races (Aryan superiority)
National Socialist German Worker’s Party
Hitler becomes leader of NSDAP – commonly called: NAZI
Mussolini
made Italy the first Fascist State
Hitler attempts:
attempts to seize power with others in support (Ludendorff, Rohm. etc.) - leads the Beer Hall Putsch (coup) in Munich
Hitler dictates:
dictates his worldview in Mein Kampf (My Struggle)
Germany
Hitler is appointed Chancellor here
President Paul von Hindenburg (WW I fame)
appointed Hitler as Chancellor
DT - Enabling Act is passed
the act permitted the Chancellor to enact legislation (laws) independently of the Reichstag - Hitler is thus dictator
DT – the Night of the Long Knives
Hitler wanted to garner support from the army
Hitler called for a meeting of the SA leadership – would move against them
The SS rounded up high-ranking SA members
SA leaders and other individuals were executed
Hitler thus “purged” the SA
SA
storm-troopers: paramilitary organization of the Nazi Party
Germany occupies & re-militarizes the Rhineland
French troops did nothing when…
Max Schmeling (DT)
knocks out Joe Louis (US) in the 12th round at Yankee Stadium
Spanish Civil War
“dress rehearsal” for further conflict - Soviet Union supports the loyalist Spanish regime
“Rape of Nanjing” (aka Nanking)
in this Chinese city, JP troops run wild among the civilians (civilians murdered, women raped)
DT annexes Austria
termed the “Anschluss” - Austria is “reunited” with Germany
Munich Conference
Appeasement - “peace for our time” - GB & FR sign the Munich Pact
At the Munich Conference:
Hitler promised the Sudetenland would be “the last territorial claim I have to make in Europe”
DT – Kristallnacht
“The Night of Broken Glass” - Nazis attacked Jewish persons & property
Nazi-Soviet Pact
Germany & the USSR pledge non-aggression against one another
Germany attacks Poland
launches its Blitzkrieg (“lightning war”) at dawn
Einstein Letter:
FDR receives _____ , outlines atomic threat
The Manhattan Project
a top-secret atomic program
For the Manhattan Project:
refugee scientists will assist America with its atomic weapons preparation program
EU – the Phony War (aka: Sitzkrieg)
Germany pauses - they relocate from their victorious eastern position to the western area
Germany attacks France
DT cuts through the “impenetrable” Ardennes Forest - out-flanked the FR Maginot defense line
Italy declares war on FR
invades from the south
FR – “Miracle of Dunkirk”
evacuation of BR/FR troops pinned down in France - DT had a “Panzer pause”
The Battle of Britain
RAF (Royal Air Force) bombed DT late August - DT offensive was diverted to BR cities - had the Luftwaffe not shifted to city bombing, the RAF may have lost
US – Lend-Lease Act
explained by FDR’s garden hose metaphor,
Operation Barbarossa
Germany invades the Soviet Union/Russia, the largest military operation in human history
Moscow
DT forces stop c. 20 miles from:
Einsatzgruppen (SS commando units)
following DT troop invasions were the mobile killing squads
Leningrad – Moscow – Stalingrad
Russian Campaign – the Russians/Soviets will win 3 major battles:
siege of Leningrad:
civilians starve
Japan attacks Pearl Harbor
Germany declares war on the US
carrier-borne aircraft (carrier radio silence)
JP pulls off a surprise attack using:
the US strategy after Pearl Harbor
finish Germany first – maintain/hold off Japan
“Bataan Death March”
US surrender Philippine Islands
Battle of Midway
middle of the Pacific
D-Day
the invasion of Normandy (France)
Operation Overlord
launched by the Allies, under Gen. Eisenhower
Background of D-Day
Atlantic Wall, Rupert, Higgins boat, a sleeping Hitler
EU – Battle of the Bulge
a last-gasp, surprise DT offensive - 101st Airborne encircled (surrounded) at Bastogne using armored support, General Patton’s forces liberated (rescued/relieved) the 101st
Fire-bombing of Tokyo
US B-29 bombers using napalm (incendiary jelly) & other incendiaries
Battle of Okinawa
Kamikaze attacks
US - Manhattan Project Tests
spearheaded by J. Robert Oppenheimer
Hiroshima hit with Atomic Bomb
explodes slightly above the city center
Holocaust definiton
systematic state-sponsored extermination of “undesirables” by the Nazis & collaborators – in total, c. 6 million Jews & c. 6 million others (figures estimated/vary by source) became victims
Nazi racial ideology
characterized Jews (& others: Poles, Slavs, etc.) as Untermenschen (sub-human)
Nazi policy moved from:
persecution to ghettoization, to liquidation, to factory-like annihilation
Liquidation
Einsatzgruppen (SS) estimated to have killed over 1 million people
Annihilation
Reinhard Heydrich convened the Wannsee Conference
purpose: to organize the “final solution to the Jewish question”
Extermination camps
Auschwitz-Birkenau in Poland
Witness
to prevent the actions from being labeled as Allied propaganda (& later “Holocaust Denial”), \n General Eisenhower wanted DT civilians, military personnel, journalists, etc. to pass through the camps