The+World+War+II+Era

= **__The Influence of the World War II Era on World History__** = toc By Zach Northenscold and Gunnar Kuehl

Significance
The 1940s were some of the most influential years in not just American history, but world history as well. Filled with violent war, Nazi propaganda, and genocide, this decade is often viewed infamously. However, it was also a decade of great advancements in technology and domestic living. It greatly impacted future generations and international relations for years to come.

======



Significant Events of the 1940s
||
 * ~ Domestic Events ||~ World Events ||
 * = Ending of depression in U.S. ||= Hitler comes to power ||
 * = Lessening in car production ||= World War II ||
 * = Attack on Pearl Harbor ||= Holocaust ||
 * = Nationwide rationing ||= Formation of the United Nations ||
 * = Women fuel the workplace ||= Creation of Israel ||
 * = <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Franklin Roosevelt elected to four terms ||= <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Formation of NATO ||
 * = <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Invention of nuclear bomb ||= <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Beginning of Cold War ||

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Setting the Stage
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 19px;">World War II took place in the early 1940's. The Allied Powers were Britian, France, and the United States. We were against the Axis Powers: Germany, Japan, and Italy. It all started when Adolf Hitler, after taking over the German government, started invading Western European countries (such as Poland and Austria) with his Nazi stormtroopers. After trying to appease Hitler a couple times, England and France declared war on Germany. Meanwhile, as the U.S. thought that it had a good relationship with Japan, Japan shocked us and attacked our Navy fleet at Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941. President Roosevelt asked Congress for a declaration of war almost immediatly afterwards, and we were suddenly in a war with Japan. After we found out about the Zimmerman Note (a telegram from Germany to Mexico saying that they should wage war on us), we declared war on the rest of the Axis Powers. World War II had officially begun for the United States...

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">media type="youtube" key="Sv1niwxQgoY" height="276" width="333" align="left"U.S. Involvement in the War
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 19px;">During the war, we were fighting on two fronts: the European front and the Pacific theater.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 19px;">For a while (before we officially were engaged in WWII) we were sending pilots to fight with the British Royal Air Force. Once we did engage fully, we entered Europe through two operations. Operation Torch's goal was to get rid of the Italian dictator Mussolini under General George S. Patton. We joined up with the British in North Africa, advanced, and took on and defeated the Nazis there that were under the command of the Nazi General Rommel. From there we advanced North into Italy to take down Benito Mussolini. Soon after we defeated the Germans occupying Italy, Mussilini was captured and shot by Italian rebels. From there those troops advanced into Eastern Europe. As that was going on, the U.S. was about to lauch another operation. Dubbed Operation Overlord, which was also known as D-Day, the invasion forces were to land on the Omaha and Utah beaches in France and advance east under the command of General Dwight D. Eisenhower. They landed, and intense fighting followed. At first, we were seemingly loosing the fight, but we finally did manage to take the beaches from the Germans. We then slowly advanced eastward and liberated Paris. We met up with other troops and continued to advance onto Germany. We met up with the Soviets by the Elbe River and Germany officially surrendured on May 7th, 1945. Hitler had commited suicide a few days before the surrender in a fortified bunker.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> The other front was the Pacific theater. In charge of the whole thing was General George MacArthur (whom Mr. Bohme has an intense dislike for). At first we were losing all the battles in the Pacific. One big one was the Battle of the Java Sea in which a combined ally navy fleet was destroyed by the Japanese. However, we came back and started winning. A couple decisive battles in the Pacific fight were Midway and the Battle of Coral Sea. In both battles we defeated the Japanesse Air Force or Navy succesfully stopping their advance into the area around Australia. Following all of this is the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan. Hiroshima was hit first on August 6th, 1945, and Nagasaki was bombed three days later on the 9th of August, 1945. Japan formally surrendered on August 15th, 1945, ending WWII. Looks like the bombs got their attention. ===<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; height: 223px; width: 272px;"> ===

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Aftermath
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The total number of deaths caused by World War II can never be known precisely. Numbers from fifty to seventy million people (including those killed through the Holocaust) have been estimated. However, it is certain that World War II was one of the most deadly events in human history. The war took place over a larger area of land and sea than any previous conflict and involved the only use of nuclear weapons in a war to date. Shortly before the war ended, the three leaders in the Allied movement (Winston Churchill, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Joseph Stalin) met to determine the fate of Europe after their ensuing victory. Known as the Yalta Conference, this meeting led to the dividing of the European nations, the creation of the United Nations, and the occupation and reparations required of Germany. The three world leaders agreed that Nazi criminals were to be hunted down after the war and that Germany should be divided, occupied, and demilitarized. Democratic elections were intended to be set up for newly liberated Poland, but the promise to do so was overlooked.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The end of World War II ushered in a new era of military competition (primarily between the U.S. and the Soviet Union). Two alliances (NATO and the Warsaw Pact) were formed after the war. These organizations accelerated the ensuing Cold War as the U.S. and the Soviet Union raced for superiority.

===<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; height: 302px; width: 273px;"> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The Holocaust ===

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Causes
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In the 1930s, Adolf Hitler became leader of Germany. Hitler intended to create a "master race" through Germany. This plan to create a "perfect" society included the killing of those who didn't fit the Nazi standard of perfection. Jews, Gypsies, and other "inferior" peoples were systematically killed off in some of the most horrific ways possible.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The Victims
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The death toll of the Holocaust is estimated as being between four and eleven million individuals (depending on the inclusion of certain groups). Jews were the most numerous victims of genocide in the forties with close to six million deaths brought on by the Nazi regime. Other minorities had numbers in the hundred thousands. Many of these deaths were brought about through concentration camps stationed in various nations controlled by Germany, such as Poland and Austria. Hard labor, abuse, and even human experimentation killed the majority of those who entered the camps' gates. For the survivors, the horrors of the Holocaust remain a permanent memory. <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #810081; display: block; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; text-align: left;">media type="youtube" key="CkzIC_bwxT8" width="269" height="223" align="left" Here is a gallery of just some of the horrors of one of the most feared concentration camps: Auschwitz. <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">@http://www.deathcamps.info/Auschwitz/index.htm

And here is a movie trailer for a movie about the Holocaust. It's called //The Boy in the Striped Pajamas//.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Effects
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The Holocaust is likely the most well known act of genocide in world history. It made the world more aware of the prosecution the Jews faced and created an urgent need for a safe haven for them. After the war, in order to prevent another mass genocide, the Allied Powers aided the Jews in forming their own nation. A legal promise called the Balfur Declaration guaranteed Jews land in the Middle East that was considered holy. However, this area was controlled by Palestine which was not willing to give it up. Its threats were overlooked, and Israel was formed as the Jews' new homeland. The ensuing war between Israel and Palestine was only the first of many since Israel's creation in 1948. Many of the current Middle East conflicts involve terrorism and violence that occurs in Israel as various groups struggle for dominance in the holy land.

===<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The Cold War ===

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Setting the Stage
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The Cold War wasn't really a war. Instead, it was a standoff and nuclear weapons build-up by two world powers at the time: the communist Soviet Union and the democratic United States. After WWII was finished, there were many countries that had been controlled by Germany during the war. The Soviet Union wanted to control them rather than let them go free. In Berlin, the Soviet Union fought to control the majority of the city. The rest of the Allies eventually split the German capital with the Soviets. We controlled the better western half of the city with the other allies, and the Soviets got control of the poorer, eastern half. Life was hard on the East side, and people started to try to get over to the other side, so the Soviets built the Berlin Wall to stop them. Tensions escalated when Soviet soldiers started to stop supplies from going into the western side. It got to the point that we had to perform the Berlin Airdrop in order to get supplies in. Things just got worse and worse (especially when the Soviets acquired nuclear capabilities). The tensions of nuclear build-up ran off into the rest of the century and led to numerous conflicts that affected U.S.–Soviet relations greatly.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Effects and Escalation:
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Cold War Chronology

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The Cold War carried on throughout the twentieth century until the Soviet Union's collapse in 1991.

===The United Nations=== The UN is located in New York City and was formed because of WWII. The term was first coined by F.D.R. in 1942 when he described the Allied Powers fighting against the Axis Powers, however, it was not officially formed until October 24, 1945, and at that point, it had a grand total of 51 nations involved in it. Its official purpose was (and still is) to "bring all of the nations of the world together for peace and development based on the principals of justice, human dignity and the well being of all people". They do this in a couple of ways. They can send in troops from various nations (seems to always be lead by the U.S.) on a peace keeping mission or to maintain security in an area, they can send supplies in to a country or region, they can put sanctions against a country to make a point, and they can hold world trials which usually involve war crime charges. Most of the time, the UN will get involved in a situation when there are civilian casualties or other human rights issues. For example, in Libya, Ghadafi was killing civilians, so the UN got involved. Some people get the UN and NATO mixed up. NATO is the U.S. and our allies. The UN consists of many of the nations that work for world peace and human rights, some of which are not our allies.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Other World Events

 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Chinese Communist Party takes control of China
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">//The Diary of a Young Girl// by Anne Frank is published
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Mohandas Gandhi demands independence for India
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Arab-Israeli War
 * Apartheid begins in South Africa
 * Formation of the U.N.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">media type="youtube" key="2pfCFU3Mqww" width="381" height="315" align="right" Work and Education

 * Unemployment drops drastically
 * Women take over for men in factories during the war (increased role in society)
 * College becomes available to public (trend continues to today)

Science and Technology

 * Mass production of penicillin (common drug today)
 * Creation of atomic bomb (Manhattan Project starts history of nuclear weaponry)
 * Willard Libby develops carbon dating (used in modern forensics and sciences)
 * Computers first developed

Culture and Home Life

 * Swing, bebop, jazz, and country music are popular
 * Film Noir popularized
 * Clark Gable one of top actors in Hollywood
 * Commercial TV begins
 * Rationing controls fashion
 * Jackie Robinson signed to the Dodgers (desegregating baseball)
 * Baby boom begins when soldiers return from war (new generation born out of war)

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Sources

 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">http://en.wikipedia.org (various pages for different topics)
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">@http://www.ushmm.org/
 * <span style="color: #0e774a; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/death.htm
 * @http://kclibrary.lonestar.edu/decade40.html

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Discussion Area
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">//Any comments and/or feedback is greatly appreciated!//

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">include component="comments" page="The World War II Era" limit="10"