- America needed time! Race against the clock to pump out war materials, transport forces to spaced-out regions, send food and munitions to allies before Germany could take control of Europe and their scientists could make dangerous weapons like the atomic bomb
The Shock of War:
- America united against Japan (b/c of Pearl Harbor).
- Immigrants weren't witch-hunted, minorities blended in.
- Japanese (mostly on Pacific Coast) were feared -> government forcibly herded them in concentration camps (prejudice and post-war hysteria).
- 1944, Supreme Court declared this constitutional Korematsu v. US
- Enemy Aliens: Japanese, Germans, and Italians - internment camps
- 1942 -> Conservative Congress, New Deal retired
- WWII was no crusade, majority of people couldn't tell you what the Atlantic Charter said, many didn't know what we were fighting for.
Building the War Machine:
- War Production Board - American factories pumped out weapons, halted manufacture of cars, gas-rationing for rubber.
- Farmers (using machinery) increased crop output.
- Scarcity of goods -> inflation. Office of Price Administration kept prices under control w/ regulations like rationing meat and butter.
- War Labor Board limited wage increases. Labor unions grew; labor walkouts hindered industries
- 1943 Smith-Connally Anti-Strike Act: authorized federal government to seize and operate tied-up industries (took over coal mines and railroads). Strikes against gov-operated industry were criminal offenses.
Manpower and Womanpower:
- Draft=> 15 million meant, 216,000 women (WAAC, WAVEs, SPARs) (noncombat duties)
- Industrial and ag workers exempted, but still huge shortages => Mexican agricultural workers "braceros"
- Women worked in factories (gov daycares established), but many women still stayed home
- After war 2/3 of women workers returned home for family obligations (to mother "baby boomers"
Wartime Migrations:
- War industries sucked people into boomtowns (LA, Detroit, Seattle). CALIFORNIA GREW!
- South given $6 billion for industrial facilities => recovery of the South, became "sunbelt"
- Blacks went North and West. Tensions over segregation. A. Philip Randolph threated a Negro March on Washington - demanded equal opportunities for black in war jobs and armed forces.
- =>FDR forbid discrimination in defense industries, established Fair Employment Practices Commission (FEPC) to enforce this.
- Blacks also drafted, but service branches. -> NAACP membership grew, Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) founded 1942.
- 1944 mechanical cotton-picker invented -no need for blacks in Dixieland - dispersed! Became urban.
- Native Americans moved from reservations to war industries and even joined the armed forces (code-talkers).
- Race riots against Mexicans and blacks
Holding the Home Front:
- The war ended the depression, and double the GNP. Personal income doubled, even with taxes. Prices inflated
- More government intervention than even the New Deal: people worked for gov. in armed forces, defense industries monitored by FEPC and WLB, gov sponsored day care, health plans
- Wartime cost: $330 billion. Income tax expanded and tax rates rose up to 90%, but majority of money for war was borrowed -> national debt raised to $259 billion
The Rising Sun in the Pacific:
- Japan attacked Guam, Wake, British Hong Kong, and Malaya. Blocked Burma road (where US would supply China). Then took Dutch East Indies.
- Philippines - US General MacArthur- defense at Bataan - held of Japanese until 1942
- MacArthur ordered to Australia (aww the movieee!!) US surrendered in Philippines -> Bataan Death March to prisoner of war camps
- Japan took control of Philippines
Japan's High Tide at Midway:
- Japanese invaded New Guinea, northern Australia, and Soloman Islands
- May 1942 naval battle - Coral Sea - US and Aust. vs. Jap. (US VICTORY)
- Japanese seized Midway Island (north of Hawaii). June 1942 battle - Chester W. Nimitz and Raymod A. Spruance - victory!!
- Japanese took islands Kiska and Attu near Alaska -> US defense at Alaska!
- 1942, Japan suffered "victory disease."
American Leapfrogging Toward Tokyo:
- Aug 1942 - US troops successfully drove Japanese out of Guadalcanal (Soloman Islands)
- Aug 1944 - MacArthur managed to get New Guinea
- American strategy to bomb Japanese strongholds - under Nimitz, Attu and Kiska retaken 1943, Gilbert Islands 1943, Marshall Islands 1944.
- Air attacks on Marianas (Guam) and the Philippine Sea
- US got Marianas => Nov 1944 started round-the-clock bombing of Japan.
The Allied Halting of Hitler:
- Trouble in Atlantic with German submarines
- Ally antisubmarine tactics improved - cracked German codes
- Air bombs on Germany. Germans under Marshal Erwin Rommel went into Egypt, but British Bernard Montgomery drove them back to Tunisia.
- Russia launched crushing counteroffensive = 1943 Stalin had regained 2/3 of Soviet Union
A Second Front from North Africa to Rome:
- USSR was getting creamed w/ losses, wanted 2nd front to divert Germans westward
- Assault on French N. Africa (Nov. 1942) led by Dwight D. Eisenhower -> mighty waterborne attack, German-Italian army surrendered. (May 1943).
- Jan 1943 FDR and Winston Churchill met in Casablanca, Morocco. Agreed to step up Pacific war, invade Sivily, and insist upon "unconditional surrender" of enemy (controversial).
- Allies victorious at Sicily, Italy surrendered unconditionally Sept 1943.
- Germans stayed in Italy and Italy declared war w/ them 1943
- Rome taken 1944. Italy was a sideshow that distracted both sides.
D-Day: June 6, 1944:
- FDR stopped in Cairo, talked w/ Churchill and Jiang Jieshi (China) about the war against Japan
- Nov 28-Dec 1 1943 - Teheran Conference w/ FDR, Churchill, and Stalin: agreed to launch Soviet attacks on Germany from east and Allied assault from West
- Brits and Americans under Eisenhower attacked French Normandy on D-Day. Sea and air attacks, crippled railroads, bombed gas plants. Lunged across France under George S. Patton. Aug 1944, Paris freed!!
- Allies move to Germany. Aachen (1st important city) fell Oct 1944.
FDR: The Fourth-Termite of 1944:
- Republicans nominated Thomas E. Dewey - popular gov. of NY w/ isolationist running mate John W. Bricker. Platform called for prosecution of war and new League of Nation-like organization.
- Aging FDR nominated for Democrats, but focus was put on VP -> Harry S (his full middle name was the letter S!) Truman. (past VP Wallace ditched b/c he was an unstable liberal)
Roosevelt Defeats Dewey:
- Dewey made speeches, "time for a change," won't alter basic strategy, but I'll fight the war better
- CIO assisted in campaigning for FDR. He won 432 to 99 b/c the war was going well and he was experienced.
The Last Days of Hitler:
- German's last offensive- The Battle of the Bulge, Dec-Jan 1945
- March 1945, Eisenhower's troops marched through Germany and met up w/ Soviet comrades. Saw the shocking realities of concentration camps.
- April 1945 captured Berlin -> Hitler committed suicide Apr. 30
- FDR died Apr. 12 1945 - cerebral hemorrhage -> Truman prez
- May 7, Germany surrendered unconditionally. May 8, 1945 V-E Day (Victory in Europe).
Japan Dies Hard:
- US submarines destroyed 50% of Japan's merchant fleet
- March 1945, fire-bomb raid on Tokyo
- General MacArthur went to Philippines, huge battle at Leyte Gulf (Oct 1944) - Americans won.
- Manila fell March 1945, Philippines conquered July.
- March 1945 island Iwo Jima captured (heavy US losses)
- Okinawa (Japanese Island) captured next (heavy US losses)
- US navy damaged from suicide pilots "kamikazes"
The Atomic Bombs:
- Potsdam Conference (Berlin, July 1945). Truman, Stalin, and British leaders met and came up with ultimatum.
- America warned Japan: surrender or be destroyed.
- FDR ot Congress to make $2 billion available for atom bomb project (w/ Albert Einstein) -> feared Germnay would beat them to it.
- Tested 1st atomic bomb near Alamogordo, NM (July 1945)
- August 6, 1945 - atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima (killed 180,000)
- August 8, 1945 - Stalin enters war against Japan -> overrun Manchuria and Korea in 6-day victory parade
- Japanese stilll didn't surrender. August 9, dropped 2nd bomb on Nagasaki (80,000 killed)
- Aug 10, Japanese said peace on the condition that they keep their emperor, Hirohito; Aug 14 Allies accept
- Sept 2, 1945 V-J Day
The Allies Triumphant:
- REREAD!!!!!!!!!! IMPORTANTE
