Chapter 35: America in World War II

Women and World War II(“Rosie the Riveter”)

• New opportunities because of the demand for workers

• Still faced hostility in male-dominated businesses

• Were expected to completetheir “domestic” duties

• WAC (Women’s Army Corps)• WAVES (Women Accepted

for Volunteer Emergency Service – Navy)

Organizing the American Economy for War• The War Production Board– The goal: make America the “arsenal of democracy” with

conversions of industry• Automakers would now make airplanes and tanks• Other workers would retrain workers for wartime tasks

• G.D.P. (gross domestic product) rises rapidly• The National War Labor Board manages union

leaders and business owners to settle disputes• Government spending rises to new levels– Taxes account for 45% (“withholding” is introduced)– War bonds help in financing the war

• Office of Price Administration controls prices thereby controlling inflation (too many $ chasing too few goods)

The Internment of Japanese-Americans• Were they loyal? Sabotage? Did their spies cause Pearl Harbor?• “Enemy Aliens” (Germans, Italians, Japanese) had to register with

the government and carry identification

• The Japanese-Americans didnot have political power and were potentially more easily recognized

• Executive Order 9066 (February 1942) goes into effect and even native born Japanese-Americans are sent to internment camps inland

• Korematsu v. US– Fred Korematsu was a

native born citizen whodisobeyed the law andappealed it all the way to the Supreme Court

– The Court upheld the decision on the grounds that a group’s civil rights can be set aside in time of war

• 100,000 were forced to relocate into guarded “barracks”

• 442nd Regimental Combat team was an all-Japanese unit

African-Americans and WWII• The Double V Campaign: Victory for

democracy at home and abroad• Black G.I.’s were segregated and were

not permitted in combat (at first)• Tuskegee Airmen

• there were many people who thought that black men lacked intelligence, skill, courage and patriotism.• Bomber escorts and direct combat• The only fighter group to never

lose a bomber to enemy planes

African-Americans and WWII• At the same time Executive Order 9066 inters

Japanese-Americans, Executive Order 8802 outlaws discrimination against African-Americans in the defense industry

• A.Philip Randolph had threatened a march on Washington if black civil rights were not protected

• The Great Migration continued to northern industrial cities– Blacks may have escaped the South but not racism– The National Urban League fought for equal

opportunities in housing and employment– The Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) confronted

discrimination with nonviolent resistance

Jewish Americans and WWII• Nazi persecution of Jews in Germany began in

1933 as soon as Hitler rose to power• The 1924 National Origins Act restricted

immigration (remember the nativism and lack of tolerance during the 1920’s?)

• Anti-Semitism led to a lack of support for European Jews

• The War Refugee Board was created in 1944 to finally help Jewish refugees

Mexican Americans and WWII• Discrimination had barred many Mexicans from better

jobs in the United States• During the war, laborers were needed– The bracero program allowed short term work contracts to

be filled by Mexicans in the farms and on the railroads• June 1943: Zoot Suit Riots– Zoot suits were associated with

Mexican teenagers (pachucos) and gangs who roamed barrios (neighborhoods) in Los Angeles

– Mobs of sailors and marines sought out Mexicans and others wearing a zoot suit and beat them

– Another example of racial prejudice and intolerance

The Situation in Europe in December 1941• The Nazis break the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact with

Operation Barbarossa in June, 1941 (too late?)– Germany had attacked the USSR and was pushing toward

Moscow and the oil-rich Caucacus Region • Hitler needed oil and needed to keep from the Allies– Irwin Rommel (“The Desert

Fox” of the Afrika Korps) would help him control N. Africa

• Europe or the Pacific, first? (“Europe First”)

• Military rule by the Nazis was harsh in Europe

The Situation in Europe in December 1941• The “final solution” to the “Jewish question” was

underway– Jews were crowded into ghettos (small sections of

cities) that could be guarded• Starvation and disease killed thousands

– Others were sent to concentration camps and executed with poison gas

The War in Europe• Where to attack first?– In North Africa and move into Italy?– In France and stage forces in Great Britain?– In the USSR and help our new ally, the Soviets?

• November 1942 the US invades northern Africa– Led by Generals Bradley and Patton, Axis resistance

collapses by May 1943• Italy surrenders in September but Germans there

fight fiercely to keep the US out• The USSR fights alone and turns the tide at Stalingrad– 200,000 Germans and 1 million Soviets die– Geography, climate and population doom the Nazis

The War in Europe• Meanwhile the American pilots rely on precision

bombing of Axis targets while the British pilots rely on saturation bombing

• The decision was made NOT to bomb Auschwitz (the largest concentration camp) or others– They were afraid of killing Jews being held

• June 6, 1944: D-Day– The Allies invade Normandy, France and begin the push

east into Germany• Meanwhile the Soviets push west and liberate the

camps where the true horrors of the holocaust are discovered.– Genocide = the systematic killing of a racial, political or

cultural group

The War in Europe Comes to an End• The Battle of the Bulge (December 1944) – Hitler makes one last

counteroffensive in Belgium where the line bends but does not break

• April, 1945– With the Soviets near Berlin, Hitler commits suicide– FDR dies and Harry Truman becomes president

• May 8, 1945: VE Day (Victory in Europe)

The War in the Pacific• Pearl Harbor destroyed the Pacific fleet and that allowed

Japan to further consolidate power in the Pacific• In March 1942, MacArthur and Filipino fighters left the

Philippines after defeat by the Japanese (“I shall return!”)– 7000 American prisoners die on the 63 mile “Bataan Death

March” at the hands of the Japanese• Japan controlled the Chinese coast but in the Battle of

the Coral Sea the American navy led by Admiral Chester Nimitz defeated the Japanese navy (May 1942) and the Japanese did not expand into Australia

• Meanwhile, James Doolittle and the American Air Force were bombing Tokyo

The War in the Pacific• The “Europe First” strategy hurt American commanders

in the Pacific• The policy of island-hopping (leapfrogging) is adopted– One by one, the American navy and marines would liberate

Japanese-held islands moving us closer to mainland Japan– Sometimes an island could be skipped, isolating it from

others leading to eventual surrender when supplies ran out• At the Battle of Midway (June 1942) the Japanese went

on the offensive to eliminate the American navy and failed– The Japanese never fully recovered and moved to a

defensive stand for the rest of the war

The War in the Pacific• MacArthur does return to the Philippines in

October 1944• Iwo Jima and Okinawa would

bring the U.S. even closer toJapan for invasion– Nearly all of Japan’s 22,000 soldiers die defending Iwo

Jima and 6800 Americans die in taking the island– At Okinawa, bloody combat

claimed the lives of 12,000Americans and 100,000 Japanese

• Kamikaze pilots become a newconcern

The Manhattan Project• German American scientist Albert Einstein made FDR

aware of the destructive power of nuclear bombs• By the summer of 1945, the top

secret “Manhattan Project”produced an atomic weapon

• Does the U.S. use it or not?– Perhaps 500,000 Americans

die if Japan is invaded– Many Japanese civilians

would die in the aftermath• The Japanese would not

accept unconditional surrender and they showed their determination to fight at Iwo Jima, Okinawa and with kamikaze pilots

• August 6, 1945– The Enola Gay drops the first atomic

bomb (“Little Boy”) on Hiroshima– 80,000 people die

• August 9, 1945– A second bomb (“Fat Man”) is

dropped on Nagasaki– 40,000 people die

• It is estimated a total of 250,000 died as a result of the blast or by burns, radiation poisoning or cancer

• August 14, 1945– V-J Day