9.8 - Holocaust and Atomic Bomb

THE HOLOCAUST

Background Information

• Nazi Germany’s attempt to exterminate the Jewish people
    * Anti-semitism ingrained in culture
    * Methods of persecution evolved and increased
    * Use of concentration and labor camp
• Allied forces freeing Jews along path to Berlin
    * Prior knowledge of events existed
    * Learned of full extent upon sight
    * Results = 6 million Jews massacred.

Resisting the Holocaust

• Warsaw Ghetto Revolt - July 1942
• Coordinated efforts to hide Jews from Nazis
    * Denmark and Bulgaria - saved entire Jewish populations
    * Anne Frank
    * The Church provided shelters and priests provided shelter.

War Crime Trials

• Axis leaders tried for “crimes against humanity”
• Most prominent = Nuremberg Trials
    * 200 Germans and Austrians are tried
    * Most found guilty in different capacities
• Similar trials held in Italy and Japan
• Discredited totalitarian and militarist ideologies.
• The leaders and people in power who did nothing were held accountable

NUCLEAR WARFARE

Impact on WWII

• US trying to figure out how to end war
    * Battles of Battles of Iwo Jima & Okinawa = 75,000 American casualties
    * Both were American victories

  * Americans wanted to end war quickly - evaluated options

Manhattan Project

• Early 1900s - understood matter was made up of atoms
    * Potential to create pure energy
    * Discovered in Germany -> German scientists fled to US
• January 1942 - FDR approved development of atomic bomb 
• August 1942 - Manhattan Project formally begins
    * J. Robert Oppenheimer = project leader
• July 1945 - 1st successful atomic bomb in New Mexico
    * Informed President Truman

WWII in Pacific

• US issues warning to Japan to surrender - ignored
• August 6, 1945 - atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima
    * 70,000 instantly killed
• August 8, 1945 - atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki
    * 40,000 instantly killed
• August 10, 1945 - Emperor Hirohito & Japan surrender