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 * The Great Depression**

__The Start__ Despite prosperity, several weaknesses in the U.S. economy started to cause issues. These weaknesses were uneven distribution of wealth, overproduction by business and agriculture, and the fact that Americans were buying less goods. A big gap between the rich and poor started to develop. Vendors were not able to sell all their goods, which led to stores cutting back on orders from factories. A giant decrease in factory production followed, which led to factory workers getting laid off. Crop production increased. More competition in other countries dropped price due to surplus of crops. The stocks were high and people didn't think that anything bad was going to happen. Everyone thought that it was the right time to buy stocks. Soon, the stock market crashed and people couldn't payback purchases they had made and the stocks they had bought were worthless. Soon after the crash, unemployment numbers raised as industrial production, prices, and wages lowered and this led into a period known as the Great Depression. Factory production got cut in half, farmers lost most of their lands, and banks couldn't give people the money in their savings accounts.(3)

__A Global Depress ion __ Soon the depression turned worldwide. American bankers wanted people overseas to repay their loans. American investors ended up taking their money from Europe. The market for European goods severely dropped due to high tariffs placed on them because Congress wanted Americans to buy American goods. This policy backfired and conditions worsened in the United States. Also, European countries that depended on Americans buying goods suffered. World Trade dropped by 65%. Germany and Austria were hit hard because they had high war debts to pay and depended on American loans and goods. In Asia, farmers and workers suffered due to the value of exports decreasing. Latin America suffered because they depended on American and European demand for their goods. This led to their prices collapsing.(1)

__Roosevelt Begins the Recovery Efforts__ Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected president in 1933. Roosevelt immediately began the recovery effort by establishing his program called the New Deal. The New Deal had large public works that helped provide jobs for people. It's new governmeant agencies gave financial help to businesses and farms. Large amounts of government money was spent on welfare programs. This program eventually brought America's economy out of the deep hole it was in.(1)

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 * The Rise of Dictators in Europe**

__Adolf Hitler Comes to Power__ Adolf Hitler was a decorated war vetern for Germany. After World War 1, Hitler joined a political party that wanted to overturn the treaty of Versailles and combat communism. The members of this party were called Nazis and its policies were called Nazism. Nazism was the German brand of fascism. The Nazis planned on seizing Munich, but the German government found out and imprisoned Hitler. While in jail, Hitler wrote his book, //Mein Kampf//, which outlined his beliefs. When Hitler was released, he revived the Nazi party and gained many followers because Germnay's go vernment and economy had collapsed due to the Great Depression in America.(1) Soon, President Paul Von Hindenburg named Hitler chancellor of Germany. Hitler used his new power to turn Germnay into a totalitarian state. The Nazis quickly took control over the government and economy and banned other political parties. Germany was under his control.(3)

__Benito Mussolini Takes Control of Italy__ Benito Mussolini founded the Fascist Party in Italy. The people of Italy were upset because Italy had failed to win territorial gains at the Paris Peace Conference. The popularity of the Fascist Party grew as inflation and unemployment grew. Mussolini promised that he could rebuild the economy and rebuild the army. He publicly criticized the Italian government and caused fear of a strike. People from all social classes joined with him. The Fascist's marched on Rome and demanded Mussolini be put in charge of Italy. The king was forced to legally give up his leadership to Mussolini. Once in power, he instantly abolished democracy and other political parties. Italy allied itself with Germany.(1)

__Joseph Stalin Transforms Russia__ Josef Stalin succeed Vladimir Lenin as leader of the Soviet Union. When Stalin came to power, he turned Russia into a totalitarian state. Stalin pushed communist ideas on his people and controlled all propaganda. During his reign as dictator, he turned the Soviet Union into a political and industrial power.(1)




 * The Beginning of WWII**

__Japan Pursues An Empire__ When the Great Depression began, Japanese people blamed their government. Militarists gained popularity and soon took over the country. Soon these Japanese militants invaded Manchuria, a province in China, for resources. When this happened, Japan was kicked out of the League of Nations. Soon a full scale war erupted between China and Japan. The Japanese aggression encouraged many other leaders to attack.(1)

__Mussolini invades Ethiopia__ Mussolini dreamed of expanding Italy's empire. He wanted to invade Ethiopia to make up for earlier defeats. Ethiopian weapons were no match for the Italians. The League did nothing to stop this invasion in hopes of maintaining peace in Europe.(1)

__Hitler Starts the Fighting__ Hitler announced that he was going to defy the Treaty of Versailles and rebuild his army. Hitler soon occupied the Rhineland, an area separating Germany from France. The British and French let him do this to keep peace. Hitler allied himself with Japan and Italy and they formed the Axis Powers. Hitler, also, sent troops into Austria and annexed it. Then he turned to a Czechoslovakian region known as Sudetenland, where many German-speaking people lived, and demanded that it be given to Germany. The Czechs refused and turned to France for help. Britain and France held the Munich Conference and declared the Germany be given Sudetenland in order to avoid war. Later Hitler took all of Czechoslovakia. Hitler made a Nonaggression Pact with Russia declaring that neither country would ever attack the other. This pact stated that Poland would be split in half with the two countries and that the Soviets could have all of the countries above Poland.(1)

__The Fighting Continues__ Hitler moved ahead with plans and attempted to conquer Poland by bombing their capital, Warsaw. The artillery was too much for the Polish and they quickly fell. Britain and France both declared war on Germany. Germany used a new strategy called the Blitzkrieg in which they quickly swarmed countries with forces and took them by surprise. The Soviets mover in and took the other half of Poland. Also, they conquered the countries above it. Most of the countries fell fast, but Finland resisted. Finland fought valiantly and forced Russia to suffer heavy losses, but eventually they fell.(1)




 * Major Battles of World War II **

__//The Battle of Midway//__

The Japanese wanted to take out the United States as strategy in the Pacific Theater. Operating the Midway Point Atoll would extend their defensive perimeter and force the American air craft to fight. The Americans had, however, cracked the Japanese code and sort of knew where the Japanese would be and when. The Japanese didn't really know any strengths of the United States. The United States faced four carriers of the Japanese, but they had an airfield on Midway making the field almost even only waiting on who discovered who first. Americans found the Japanese but failed to hit any targets. An attack was launched from Midway on June 4th destroying most of the American planes operating from there, but the American aircraft wouldn't budge. Four of the Japanese were sunk, and most were killed. Midway gave Allies strategic ways to be on the offensive for the rest of the war in the Pacific. (2)



__Map__ **__of__** __the Battle of Midway__

__//Battle of Stalingrad//__

This battle was not a good one for Germany making victory in the East almost impossible. Tiler was sure he could beat the Red Army as long as the weather was no longer an issue for his army. The Stalingrad capture was very important since it was a huge source of transportation between the Caspian Sea and northern Russia, and it also got them to Caucasus which was rich in oil. The Luftwaffe reduced the city to debris and provided the River Volga which was extremely important for bringing supplies into the city that were unusable. By the end of August, the Germans had reached Stalingrad. The Soviets attempted to keep their lines as close to the Germans as they could. German units were forced to fight on their own, or they had to risk taking casualties. The Soviets held onto the city until winter. The Red Army attacked in November and were able to surround 300,000 Axis troops. The Germans sustained 841,000 casualties and would only launch one more offensive at Kursk. This would end up being another disastrous defeat. (1)



__Map of the Battle of Stalingrad__

__//Battle of Kursk//__

This was the final offensive attack for in the East. The Germans thought they could break through the northern and southern flanks to surround the Soviet forces. The Soviets knew Hitler’s intentions and came up with some defensive. The Germans delayed the attack to wait for new Tiger and Panther tanks. This gave the Red Army even more time to gather forces for a counterattack. The Germans decided to delay the attack in order to wait for new Tiger and Panther tanks. This gave the Red Army even more time to gather forces. The main German attack began on July 5. The German blitzkrieg was stopped. This was the first time a blitzkrieg offensive was defeated before it could break through defenses and into its strategic depths. The Red Army counterattacked after the failed attack. The Germans would be on the defensive for the rest of the war in the east. (2)




 * Japan's Role in WWII**

September 1940 was when Japan signed the Tripartite Pact with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy agreeing to assist each other if they were attacked by a country not already involved in the war. Japan sent troops to hold French Indochina that same month. The United States responded with economic penalties which included an embargo on oil and steel. Almost a year later, Hirohito came to the decision to battle the Americans. December 7, 1941 was the dreadful day that Japanese planes bombarded the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor near Honolulu, Hawaii. This destroyed 18 ships and killed almost 2,500 men. The United States declared war on Japan one day later. (3)

Japan occupied the Dutch East Indies, British Singapore, New Guinea, the Philippines, and a number of other locations in Southeast Asia and the Pacific for multiple months. The momentum started turning at the June 1942 Battle of Midway and at Guadalcanal. Japan’s military leaders realized that victory was not likely, but the country did not stop fighting until after atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. August 15, 1945 was when Hirohito made a radio broadcast announcing Japan’s surrender. (1)

A postwar declaration kept the monarchy but had the emperor as a symbol of the state. All political power went to representatives who were elected. Hirohito was not declared as a war criminal because U.S. authorities feared it could put their occupation into chaos. 1945-1951 were the years when Hirohito examined the country with reconstruction efforts. The American occupation ended in 1952. Hirohito served in the background while Japan went through time of fast economic growth. He died on January 7, 1989, spending almost 64 years as leader, which is the longest royal reign in Japanese history. Hirohito’s wartime record is still a subject of a lot of debate. (3)




 * U.S. Involvement**

The United States tried their hardest in all ways to stay out of World War II. When Japan decided to attack Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, this made the United States enter World War II officially. This attack was so unexpected and surprising for the United States. The next day the United States and Britain officially declared war on the Japanese. Germany and Italy sided with Japan. British and US navies stopped the Japanese naval advance in the Pacific at Midway. United States troops stopped the Japanese's "island-hopping" advance towards Australia at Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands. (4)

In 1943, the Allies began to build an invasion force in Great Britain with their plan being to launch an attack on France across the English Channel. France was held by Germany. An enormous number of planes, ships, and tanks were ready for the attack. Eisenhower planned to hit the coast of Normandy. This invasion of Normandy, better known as Operation Overlord, was the largest land and sea attack ever. The invasion began on June 6, 1944, and it is known as D-Day. British, American, French, and Canadian troops fought onto a stretch of beach in Normandy. The Germans dug in with machine guns, rocket launchers, and cannons. They were behind concrete walls three feet thick. The Allies took huge amounts of casualties. More than 2,700 men died on the beaches that day.

The United States then wanted Germany. The Allies pushed the Germans back at the Battle of the Bulge forcing them to retreat. World War II was now coming to a close very quickly. Eisenhower accepted the surrender of the Third Reich. However, President Roosevelt had already died before he was able to witness the surrender. Harry Truman got the news saying the Nazis surrendered. The official surrender was signed on May 9, 1945.

Allies were still fighting the Japanese in the Pacific. The Japanese retreated before the allies could counterattack. Kamikazes were Japanese suicide pilots that would sink allied ships. Roosevelt responded by giving his approval for an American program, later code-named the Manhattan Project, to develop an atomic bomb. Hiroshima and Nagasaki were then bombed by the atomic bomb. (1)




 * The Holocaust**

The Holocaust was the persecution and murder of six million Jews and other discriminated groups, such as Communists and homosexuals, by the Nazis. The Nazis rose to power in Germany in early 1933. They believed that Germans were the superior race and that the Jews were inferior. In Greek, "Holocaust" literally means, "sacrifice by fire." (5)

Adolf Hitler, the leader of the Nazi movement, did not start anti-Semitism in Europe. The origins of his extreme brand of anti-Semitism is unclear. Hitler blamed the Jews for Germany's defeat in World War I, which was not uncommon. While imprisoned for treason in 1923, Hitler wrote //Mein Kampf//, in which describes his future plans for Germany. Included in it, he described a war that would wipe out the Jewish population in Europe. (3)

By September 1939, Hitler conquered western Poland. The Nazi's secret police, the Gestapo, forced thousands of people into ghettos. The Jewish ghettos were surrounded by high walls and barbed wire. The ghettos were poorly sanitized, making diseases such as typhus very common. During late 1939, the Nazis chose 70,000 mentally challenged German citizens to be gassed to death, beginning the notorious Euthanasia Program. This program was halted in August 1941, though the killings of handicapped citizens continued in secret throughout the duration of the war. (3) Throughout 1940, Hitler expanded the German Empire by conquering Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, and France. Starting in 1941, Jews from these conquered nations were brought to ghettos in Poland. When Germany invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, 500,000 Soviet Jews were murdered by Nazi mobile killing units (3). The commonly used method of shooting was regarded as inefficient, and German leaders met to discuss a "better plan" or a "Final Solution." (3)

After the Wannsee Conference in January 1942, the Nazis began deporting Jews from all over Europe to six death camps located in Poland. These camps were Chelmno, Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka, Auschwitz-Birkenau, and Majdanek. Known as the "Final Solution", the Nazis gassed and shot the Jewish prisoners. Disease and starvation spread throughout the camps. Throughout the Holocaust, six million Jews were killed, two-thirds of Jews in Europe. (5)




 * Allied Victories**

The American and British armies defeated the Germans and Italians in North Africa by 1943. Mussolini's government collapsed in July 1943, but the Allies continued to fight in Germany until 1945. (3)

The Battle at Stalingrad is considered a major turning point in the war. In the summer of 1942, Hitler set his Sixth Army to capture Stalingrad, which was a major industrial center on the Volga River. The Luftwaffe continuously bombed Stalingrad, but Stalin and the Soviets were determined to defend the city. By the time winter of 1942 set in, the Germans controlled 90 percent of Stalingrad. The Soviets launched a major counterattack, and on February 2, 1943, the Germans surrendered. This battle cost the Soviets over one million soldiers, but the result was that Germans were on the defensive. (1)

On June 5, 1944, 5,000 ships carrying troops and supplies left England, heading for France to invade at Normandy. The amphibious invasions began early in the morning on June 6. At Omaha Beach, the Americans faced heavy resistance. Over 2,000 American soldiers were killed. By June 11, all beaches were secured. Over 326,000 troops, 50,000 vehicles, and 100,000 tons of supplies landed at Normandy. In the following weeks, the Allies fought across French countryside and gained strategic lands which aided their efforts to recapture France. By late August 1944, Paris was liberated, and the Germans were defeated in northwestern France. (3)

The Allies were closing in on the Germans from the west, and the Soviets were doing the same from the east. Hitler decided to counter-attack the western front. He hoped to split up American and British forces and break up supply lines. On December 16, 1944, German tanks broke through the American defenses in the Ardennes Forest. The Allies recovered and pushed the Germans back. This push into the Allied lines earned the name, the Battle of the Bulge. (1)

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The war in Europe drew quickly to a close after the Battle of the Bulge. In March 1945, the Allies crossed the Rhine River and entered Germany. By April, three million Allied soldiers were closing in on Berlin from the southwest, and six million Soviets did the same from the east. On April 30, Adolf Hitler and his mistress, Eva Braun committed suicide in an underground bunker. On May 7, 1945, General Eisenhower accepted Germany's surrender, and on May 9, the surrender was signed in Berlin. This marked the end of World War II in Europe after six long years of fighting. (1)

In late 1944, the Philippines was liberated by the United States. Soon after, American forces began bombing raids against Japan. In June 1945, the United States captured Okinawa and Iwo Jima. On August 6, 1945, an atomic bomb was dropped on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. On August 9, a second atomic bomb was dropped by the United States on Nagasaki. About 120,000 civilians were killed by the bombs. On September 2, 1945, Japan surrendered to the United States, Great Britain, and the Soviet Union. (5)


 * Europe and Japan in Ruins**

The Second World War was more brutal than The First World War. World War II caused 60 million fatalities between both civilians and soldiers. Cities and towns across Europe were completely destroyed by bombing raids and artillery. (6)

Germany was split into two separate countries: West Germany and East Germany. After World War II, West Germany was controlled by American, British, and French forces. It was allowed to set up an independent democracy with its own government. East Germany was controlled by the Soviet Union at the end of the war. The Soviets never allowed East Germany to form an independent government. Berlin was divided into West Berlin and East Berlin, controlled by West Germany and East Germany, respectively. (9)

The United States government gave the countries in Europe $13 billion in supplies and equipment to help them rebuild. This program, called the Marshall Plan, was part of an effort to keep communism from spreading. The United States was hoping that if Europe rebounded quickly enough, the nations themselves would not adopt communism. (9)

The dropping of the atomic bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki left Japan completely in ruins. After Japan's defeat, the United States led a rehabilitation campaign to install military, political, economic, and social reforms to the weakened Japanese state. Military leaders were tried for war crimes and were banned from taking part in political leadership in the government. By 1950, Japan and the United States set out to secure a peace treaty to the war and the occupation. The United States turned their attention to stopping the spread of communism, particularly in Asia. The final agreement allowed the United States to maintain their bases in Okinawa ands elsewhere in Japan. (8)


 * Propaganda in Germany During World War II**

Most propaganda, in Germany, was produced by the Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda. Joseph Gobbels was placed in charge of this ministry soon after Hitler took over as head of Germany. He required that all writers, artists, and journalists had to register with the Ministry. The Nazi's believed in propaganda as being an important tool in achieving their goals. Hitler was impressed with how the Allies used propaganda in World War I to gain support and he believed that it had been the cause of Germany's downfall. Hitler met every day with Goebbels to discuss ideas. Goebbels then put these ideas in front of senior officials of the Ministry. All broadcasters and journalists had to get approval from the Ministry before they made their pieces public. The Nazis' information that they spread was all false, but it led to no morale difficulties. This spread of false information became known as the Big Lie. Nazi propaganda had many parties that they tried to spread information to. The Gemran people were told of the struggle of the Nazi Party against foreign enemies and internal enemies, like Jews. Germans in other countries were told that their allegiance to Germany was stronger then their allegiance to their new countries. Enemies such as France and Britain were told that Germany had no problem with them just that their governments were trying to start a war. All audiences were told of the greatness of German culture and military achievements. Before the Battle of Stalingrad, German propaganda focused on the humanity that Germany had showed to other conquered countries. After the Battle of Stalingrad, people were told that it was hopeless trying to fight Germany and their army. Gobbels, along with Hitler, committed suicide after the German defeat.(7)


 * Works Cited**

(1) World History: Patterns of Interaction

(2) listverse.com

(3) history.com

(4) u-s-history.com

(5) ushmm.org

(6) carleton.ca

(7) world-war-2.info

(8) history.state.gov

(9) fasttracktteaching.com