WwII & Return to normalcy Flashcards
(43 cards)
Long-term and short-term causes of WWI.
The best way to remember the causes is thinking M.A.N.I.A. - Militarism, Alliances, Nationalism, Imperialism and Assassination. The short-term cause was the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand. Militarism, alliances, nationalism and imperialism are the long-term causes for WWI.
Events that caused the United States to declare war on Germany in 1917: Lusitania/Zimmermann telegram/Unrestricted submarine warfare.
What happened to Lusitania and why was it important?
In 1915 it was sunk by a German U-boat, resulting in the death of 1,198 people. The Zimmerman telegram note revealed a plan to renew unrestricted submarine warfare and to form an alliance with Mexico and Japan if the United States declared war on Germany. The message was intercepted by the British and passed on to the United States; its publication caused outrage and contributed to the U.S. entry into World War I.
The scale and nature of the fighting in World War I including especially the impact of new technologies of warfare.
Losses on all fronts for the year 1914 topped five million, with a million men killed. This was a scale of violence unknown in any previous war. The cause was to be found in the lethal combination of mass armies and modern weaponry. Chief among that latter was quick-firing artillery. World War I was a war of trenches. After the early war of movement in the late summer of 1914, artillery and machine guns forced the armies on the Western Front to dig trenches to protect themselves. Fighting ground to a stalemate.
The contributions of the American military to Allied victory in World War I.
The American Expeditionary Forces arrived in Europe in 1917 and helped turn the tide in favor of Britain and France, leading to an Allied victory over Germany and Austria in November 1918. By the time of the armistice, more than four million Americans had served in the armed forces and 116,708 had lost their lives.
Propaganda and Cohan’s song, “Over There.”
The song “Over There” is about the “Yanks” (the Americans) going “over there” (across the Atlantic) to help fight the “Huns” (what the Americans called the Germans at the time) during World War I.
The Treaty of Versailles and German consequences of starting the war.
The treaty forced Germany to surrender colonies in Africa, Asia and the Pacific; cede territory to other nations like France and Poland; reduce the size of its military; pay war reparations to the Allied countries; and accept guilt for the war. By placing the burden of war guilt entirely on Germany, imposing harsh reparations payments and creating an increasingly unstable collection of smaller nations in Europe.
The circumstances that led the United States to reject the Treaty of Versailles.
Although many Americans supported the treaty, the president met resistance in the Senate, in part over concern that joining the League of Nations would force U.S. involvement in European affairs.
The reasons for the Red Scare and the resurgence of labor unrest in postwar America –i.e., Bolshevik Revolution; Labor unions; the Palmer Raids.
The Bolshevik Revolution in Russia, which led many to fear that immigrants, particularly from Russia, southern Europe, and eastern Europe, intended to overthrow the United States government; The end of World War I, which caused production needs to decline and unemployment to rise. The Palmer Raids were a series of raids conducted in November 1919 and January 1920 by the United States Department of Justice under the administration of President Woodrow Wilson to capture and arrest suspected socialists, especially anarchists and communists, and deport them from the United States.
Lenin/Bolshevik Revolution
After the 1917 February Revolution ousted the Tsar and established a Provisional Government, he returned to Russia and played a leading role in the October Revolution, in which the Bolsheviks overthrew the new regime. But measured by the size of the forces engaged, the revolution of 1917 was chiefly an agrarian revolt. The slogan of the Bolshevik leaders in 1917 was “Peace, Land, and Bread.” Bread was desired by everyone, since the war had disrupted transportation and created shortages of food in the cities.
Selective Service Act (the draft) /American Expeditionary Force (AEF); John J. Pershing
Congress passed the Selective Training and Service Act of 1940 authorizing a draft. By October 1940 all men between the ages of 21 and 35 were required to register with their local draft board. The primary role of the AEF is to maintain a level of force presence in the Area of Responsibility AOR, provide deterrence during periods of heightened tensions, and to augment the existing ground forces. How did the AEF contribute to the defeat of Germany? The American expeditionary force contributed to the defeat of Germany by having Allied forces arrive in England in a mission of invading the European continent & undertaking operations to defeat Germany. John J. Pershing was one of America’s most accomplished generals. He is most famous for serving as commander of the American Expeditionary Forces in World War I. These troops from America bolstered the spirits of European allies and helped defeat the Central Powers in 1918.
Liberty Bonds
Liberty bonds are issued by governments for funding their military operations during war. The government encourages its citizens to purchase bonds as an act of patriotism. Introduced during the First World War (WWI), liberty bonds gained popularity during the Second World War.
Pacifism
pacifism, the principled opposition to war and violence as a means of settling disputes. Pacifism may entail the belief that the waging of war by a state and the participation in war by an individual are absolutely wrong, under any circumstances.
Sussex Pledge
The Sussex Pledge was a statement by the Germans that they would not sink passenger ships without warning during World War I. The significance was that the Germans were limiting their use of submarine warfare during World War I, which kept the United States a neutral country. These were the primary elements of the pledge: Passenger ships would not be targeted. Merchant ships would not be sunk until the presence of weapons had been established, if necessary by a search of the ship. Merchant ships would not be sunk without provision for the safety of passengers and crew.
Wilson’s 14 points
Designed as guidelines for the rebuilding of the postwar world, the points included Wilson’s ideas regarding nations’ conduct of foreign policy, including freedom of the seas and free trade and the concept of national self-determination, with the achievement of this through the dismantling of European empires and the creation of new states.
League of Nations
The League failed to intervene in many conflicts leading up to World War II, including the Italian invasion of Abyssinia, the Spanish Civil War, and the Second Sino-Japanese War. The onset of the Second World War demonstrated that the League had failed in its primary purpose, the prevention of another world war.
Henry Cabot Lodge
He served in the United States Senate from 1893 to 1924 and is best known for his positions on foreign policy. His successful crusade against Woodrow Wilson’s Treaty of Versailles ensured that the United States never joined the League of Nations and his reservations against that treaty influenced the structure of the modern United Nations.
a Republican who disagreed with the Versailles Treaty, and who was the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He mostly disagreed with the section that called for the League to protect a member who was being threatened.
Suffrage
During the war years women undertook jobs normally carried out by men and proved they could do the work just as well. Between 1914 and 1918, an estimated two million women replaced men in employment, resulting in an increase in the proportion of women in total employment from 24 per cent in July 1914 to 37 per cent by November 1918.
Committee on Public Information
The Committee on Public Information produced American propaganda posters that commonly portrayed Germans as bloodthirsty animals in an effort to spur enlistment or other goals. Subsequently, German Americans suffered as the public associated them with the enemy.
The Committee on Public Information was established during World War I to turn every channel of communication and education to promote the war effort.
Why Harding won the presidency –what was the return to normalcy?
Harding’s conception of normalcy for the 1920s included deregulation, civic engagement, and isolationism. He rejected the idealism of Woodrow Wilson and the activism of Roosevelt, favoring the earlier isolationist policy of the United States. Harding’s slogan and platform, calling for disengagement from foreign intervention and for a return to business as usual, were offered as an antidote for the widespread sense of upheaval among Americans in the aftermath of World War I and in response to the deadly influenza pandemic of 1918–19, significant labour unrest, a series of race riots, and the Red Scare and resultant Palmer Raids.
The farmers’ crisis, i.e., declining food prices –why?
The government began to grow more food to support the home front, troops, and allies. However, many men left the farms to join the military, so more workers were needed in agriculture to produce the additional food required during the war. Even though Congress authorized military deferments for farm workers in 1942, agricultural employment dropped by one million during the war. Among other things, this labor shortage spurred farmers to accelerate the use of mechanical equipment. WWII left the government with a large quantity of unused ammonium nitrate and poison gases – what became America’s fertilizer and pesticides. These chemicals were a pivotal part of creating a huge food surplus and a market for cheap, high-calorie foods—especially anything with corn.
The changes in the American way of life and American values in the 1920s in the areas of consumerism, communications,
The prosperity of the 1920s led to new patterns of consumption, or purchasing consumer goods like radios, cars, vacuums, beauty products or clothing. The expansion of credit in the 1920s allowed for the sale of more consumer goods and put automobiles within reach of average Americans. In the 1920s, radio and cinema contributed to the development of a national media culture in the United States.
The changes in the American way of life and American values in the 1920s in the areas of religion, and the role of women (pink collar jobs).
As a result, a new kind of Christianity emerged - Fundamentalism. Social changes in the 1920s led to a major religious revival among conservative Christians. They did not like the influence of cinema and jazz, or the new way in which women dressed and behaved. As for pink collar jobs
The term “pink collar worker” was coined by the sociologist William J. Baumol in the 1960s. American writer and social critic Louise Kapp Howe later used and publicized it in the 1970s. Howe used the term to describe the jobs women assumed at the time, such as nurses, teachers, secretaries, etc.
The significance of the Scopes Monkey Trial (evolution in the schools)
The trial publicized the fundamentalist–modernist controversy, which set Modernists, who said evolution could be consistent with religion, against fundamentalists, who said the word of God as revealed in the Bible took priority over all human knowledge.
