World War 2 Flashcards
What led to new isolationism between 1919-41?
Anger over WWII
Congress determined to avoid repeat
What were the Neutrality Acts and what did they do?
no armed sales to combatants
no loans or credits
no americans on ships of combatants
Spanish Civil War, western response
1936-’39- no US response
Japanese and German aggression
Japan invades China: Manchuria 1931, rest 1937
Hitler violates Versailles Treaty: Germany invades, Czechoslovakia March 1939, Poland September 1939
France surrenders 1940
Lend-Lease
March 1941: allows shipments to countries ‘vital to defense’ of US
Military Equipment to UK, China, USSR
Events that led to end of U.S. isolationism (led to attack at Pearl Harbor)
Japanese dependent on US (oil, metal)
US imposes embargos
Japan attacks Pearl Harbor because they knew would go to war with US at some
point so they might as well attack the strongest Naval base
Definition of Total War:
a war fought with unlimited means
Factors contributing to Total War
Nationalism
Modern gov’t bureaucracies
Industrialization and technology
20th century ideologies and propaganda
Evidence of Total War in WWII
German starts bombing UK cities and citizens and Poland
Japan attacks Nanjing, China
Results of Total War
Total killed: 54 mil
Military deaths: 32.2 mil
Civilian deaths: 30.7 mil
Killed in holocaust: 7+ mil
Death by nation (know country suffering most deaths, country with most civilians killed)
China suffered most civilian deaths
USSR had most deaths
The Atom Bomb and WWII
US Manhattan Project
1939 Einstien writes to FDR warning of fission bomb possible
Intelligence that germany is pursuing bomb
US begins major research effort- $2 billion
Executive order 9066 Feb. 1942
FDR authorizes exclusion of people to prevent ‘espionage and sabotage”
Applied to japanese americans- 120000 people
Korematsu V. US (1944)
Ruled 6:3 was constitutional, majority said it wasn’t racial because war was pressing
Justice Murphy argues it’s racist
