world war II cold war d-day v-e day atomic bomb hiroshima nagasaki fall of berlin bay of pigs eisenhower john f. kennedy vietnam war u2 incident kent state incident containment policy

1. World War II and the Cold War

2. • In 1941, A. Philip Randolph proposed a march on
Washington D.C. to protest racial discrimination in the
military.
• President Roosevelt responded by supporting the Fair
Employment Act which prohibited discrimination in the
national defense industry.
• As the first federal law against employment
discrimination, the Fair Employment Act convinced
Randolph and his colleagues to cancel their march – but
he was still able to draw attention to the injustices facing
African Americans in the US.

3. • As Hitler blitzed through Europe, the US had their eye on
Japan in the Pacific; the US imposed an embargo on oil and
steel.
• Japan looked to the Dutch East Indies for natural resources
but to go after more territories, it had to deal with the US naval
fleet stationed in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.
• Six aircraft carries sailed across the Pacific in radio silence,
undetected – a few minutes before 8 a.m. on December 7,
1941, Japanese airplanes began the first wave of bombings
on the Pacific fleet in Pearl Harbor.
• Within 2 hours, the Japanese seriously damaged and sank 12
ships, destroyed nearly 200 warplanes, & killed or wounded
nearly 3000 people.
• The next day, FDR described December 7th as “a day that will
live in infamy” – both houses of Congress approved a
declaration of war against Japan, & later against Germany &

4. • The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor caused suspicion
& fear for US citizens – most suspected that Japanese,
German, & Italian immigrants would support the war on
the side of the Axis Powers.
• As a result, thousands were forced to internment camps;
intended to be in remote areas to keep potential
threatening citizens in an isolated location where the
government could keep an eye on them.
• The Japanese Americans suffered the most, forcing more
than 100,000 from their homes & businesses during the
war.
• In 1944, the US Supreme Court ruled that the
government internment of Japanese Americans was
lawful & justified due to “the military urgency of the
situation.”

5. • As a result, thousands were forced to internment camps;
intended to be in remote areas to keep potential
threatening citizens in an isolated location where the
government could keep an eye on them.
• The Japanese Americans suffered the most, forcing more
than 100,000 from their homes & businesses during the
war.
• In 1944, the US Supreme Court ruled that the
government internment of Japanese Americans was
lawful & justified due to “the military urgency of the
situation.”

6. • As Britain struggled to fight Germany, Roosevelt publicly
said, “If Great Britain goes down, all of us in the Americas
would be living at the point of a gun. We must be the
great arsenal of democracy.”
• March 1941, Congress passed the Lend-Lease Act
providing that the president could send aid to any nation
whose defense was considered vital to the US’s nation
security.
• If the country had no resources to pay, the US could send
it & defer payment until later.

7. • Japanese Admiral Yamamoto knew the rest of the US
Pacific fleet had to be destroyed if Japan should win the
war – hoping to fight one more decisive battle before the
US could recover from Pearl Harbor.
• The Battle of Midway in June 1942 proved to be a turning
point in the war – but this time it was the Japanese that
failed to detect the location of the enemy; the US planes
were able to attack as the Japanese were loading bombs
on their planes.
• The victory at Midway boosted American morale in the
Pacific and allowed the US to finally go on the offensive.

8. • To create a second front against Hitler in Western
Europe, the Allies planned an invasion of France.
• They appointed US General Dwight D. Eisenhower as
the supreme allied commander of Operation Overlord
which would involve hundreds of thousands of troops and
would be the largest amphibious invasion in military
history.
• The date became known as D-Day; hitting the beaches
@ Normandy, the first soldiers ashore met overwhelming
gunfire; within a week, over 500,000 troops would be
ashore.
• This force would fight its way to Paris by August 25,
1944, liberating it after 4 years of German occupation.

9. • After successfully fending off Germany’s final major
attack at the Battle of the Bulge (Dec. 1944 – Jan. 1945),
the Allies marched toward the German capital of Berlin.
• The Soviet forces were bearing down from the east;
Hitler, in a last-ditch effort sends young boys and the
elderly to defend Berlin with their lives.
• In the spring of 1945, Berlin fell before the advancing
Soviet army; in the face of certain defeat, Hitler
committed suicide on April 30th, 1945 – shortly after,
Germany surrendered, ending the war in Europe.
• People in allied countries finally celebrated V-E Day
(Victory in Europe Day) on May 8, 1945.

10. • Mobilization is the act of assembling and making
both troops and supplies ready for war.
• Poland partly mobilized its troops on August 24, 1939,
and fully mobilized on August 30, 1939, following the
increased confrontations with Germany since March
1939.
• On September 1, 1939 Germany invaded Poland, which
prompted both France and Britain to declare war on
Germany.
• However, they were slow to mobilize, and by the time
Poland had been overrun by the Axis powers, only minor
operations had been carried out by the French.
• United Kingdom mobilized 22% of its total population for

11. • War meant the US economy had to switch from
peacetime to wartime as quickly as possible; FDR est.
the War Production Board.
• This board redirected raw materials & resources from the
production of civilian consumer goods to the production
of materials needed for waging war.
• The economic result was that the US economy boomed,
standards of living increased, unemployment (from Great
Depression) decreased as industries produced the goods
needed for the war effort.

12. • With so many men off to fight the war, women became an
important part of the workforce at home.
• Women of all cultural & racial backgrounds stepped
forward to take on jobs traditionally held by men.
• “Rosie the Riveter” became to symbolize women who
entered the workforce to fill the gap left vacant by men
serving.

13. • Soon after entering WWII, the US began working on
developing the atomic bomb; this top secret project was
known as the Manhattan Project.

14. • Oppenheimer headed the Manhattan Project.

15. • Most of the development took place in laboratories at Los
Alamos, New Mexico.
• On July 16, 1945, scientists tested the new weapon in
the New Mexico desert.

16. • August 6, 1945, a specially equipped B29 bomber, called
the Enola Gay, dropped the first bomb on Hiroshima,
Japan; the blast leveled the city & killed thousands of
civilians & military personnel; many more died later b/c of
radiation.
• Two days later, the Soviet Union declared war on Japan
& invaded Manchuria.
• When Japan delayed in issuing its surrender, the US
dropped another bomb on August 9th on the city of
Nagasaki.
• Japan finally surrendered on August 14, 1945.

17. • The decision to drop the atomic bombs on the cities was
defended by Truman; he pointed out that by dropping the
bombs, an invasion of Japan was avoided, thereby
saving the lives of Allied soldiers.

18. • Pacific: naval battles, “island hopping” – attacking &
conquering one group of islands, then moved on to the
next; Japanese soldiers often preferred fighting to the
death rather than surrendering; Japanese use of
kamikaze pilots; use of the atomic bomb
• Europe: in the early years, Britain and the US focused on
North Africa & Italy; later (June 6, 1944) would invade
Europe through Normandy, France, fighting an overland
campaign to Berlin; the invasion exposed the horrible
atrocities committed by the Nazis against people they
labeled socially inferior & unfit to live – no group suffered
as much as the Jewish people.

19. • A financial plan to build up Europe worked out by former
army chief of staff and then Secretary of State George
Marshall.
• Labeled the Marshall Plan, it provided nation in war-torn
Europe with much-needed financial support from the4
US; this aid served to spark economic revival and
prosperity in these countries. Alleviating the suffering of
many people.
• Since Communist revolutions often started due to
economic hardships, the Marshall Plan went a long way
towards preventing Soviet advances into Western Europe
& became the crowning achievement of the containment
policy.

20. • Post WWII, tensions were high b/c the Allies & the Soviet
Union; neither side trusted each other – the West were
democracies with capitalist market systems, the Soviet
Union was a socialist state led by the Communist Party.
• The US and the West would focus on “containing”
Communism in those countries in which it already existed
and not let it spread any further.
• The Truman Doctrine stated that the US would not
hesitate to intervene and aid nations overseas to resist
Communism; it featured a financial plan called the
Marshall Plan.

21. • (1949) Communist Mao Tse-Tung, supported by the
Soviet Union, won control of mainland China over the
Nationalist leader, & US supported, Chiang Kai-shek.
• Chiang and his Nationalist supporters were forced to flee
to the island of Taiwan.
• The US refused to recognize the new government,
insisting that the Nationalists still represented the true
government of China.
• It used its veto power to prevent the UN from formally
recognizing Mao’s government in the newly formed
United Nations – organization founded in 1948 where
nations meet to negotiate peaceful solutions to problems.

22. • After WWII, Korea was liberated from Japan; since both
the US & Soviet Union played a role in liberation, the
nation was divided along the 38th parallel.
• The Northern half est. a Communist government while
the southern half put in place a pro-US democracy.
• In June 1950, the Korean War began when North Korean
forces crossed the 38th parallel; UN forces led by Gen.
Douglas MacArthur, pushed the North back across the
38th parallel.
• Concerned in keeping a Communist gov’t in power in the
North, the Chinese sent troops to aid the North Koreans
causing a stalemate – both sides signed a truce in 1953.
• The agreement left the country divided at almost the
same point as when the conflict started.

23. • Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy was convinced that
Communists had infiltrated high levels of gov’t & the
military.
• Eventually, however, McCarthy had to defend his views in
a series of televised hearings; by the time the hearings
ended in June 1954, most US citizens view McCarthy as
paranoid & crazy.
• “McCarthyism” – the ideas and fears of Communism
voiced by McCarthy & his supporters – began to
collapse, and the irrational fear that “Communists are
everywhere” ultimately subsided.

24. • During the 1950s, a young revolutionary, Fidel Castro,
rose to fame as the leader of the Cuban Revolution which
made him the Communist leader of Cuba.
• He executed more than 700 of his opponents and jailed
many more; the government also seized control of much
of the land & property of the country – including US
property.
• Castro allied himself with Soviet Union.

25. • With US lacking support, Castro allies himself with the
Soviet Union; Eisenhower authorized the CIA to train
anti-Castro Cuban exiles for an invasion of Cuba.
• Kennedy succeeded Eisenhower in 1961 & approved of
the operation.
• The invasion landed at the Bay of Pigs on April 17, 1961
which turned out to be a terrible failure & a huge
embarrassment for Kennedy – leaving many doubting the
ability of Kennedy to defend democracy against
Communism.

26. • Even though the Bay of Pigs invasion was a failure,
Castro still feared a US forces invasion of Cuba.
• He secretly allowed the Soviets to put nuclear missiles in
Cuba which is only 90 miles from Florida.
• US spy planes spotted them in 1962 & Kennedy
responded by authorizing a naval blockade of the island
– for 13 days, the Cuban Missile Crisis brought the US &
Soviet Union to the brink of nuclear war.
• After UN involvement, Khrushchev agreed to withdraw
the missiles in exchange for a US promise to NOT invade
Cuba.

27. • In the 1800s, France est. a colony in Vietnam; after
WWII, Vietnamese nationalists wanted their
independence from France
• Eisenhower was concerned b/c of their ties to
Communism.
• At the Geneva Accords (1954), Vietnam was divided into
2 nations: North – Ho Chi Minh est. a Communist-backed
gov’t; South – US supported the gov’t of Ngo Dinh Diem;
it wasn’t long before a war broke out
• Eisenhower & Kennedy both sent advisors to help the
South against the North & Communist rebels in the South
(Vietcong).
• After Kennedy’s assassination, Johnson was committed

28. • January 30, 1968 – North Vietnamese & Vietcong
launched a major offensive against the US & South
Vietnamese known as the Tet Offensive.
• It produced heavy fighting; The North & Vietcong were
eventually turned back but won a psychological victory.
• The Tet Offensive showed that the Communist could
launch a coordinated attack; it also led people in the US
to question HOW the US was handling the war and if the
US should be involved at all.

29. • College campuses became places of protest; students &
professors wrote books & articles criticizing the war;
many came out in public protest & demonstrations.
• Students for a Democratic Society – (SDS) launched
large protests against the war & supported social causes;
they demanded the gov’t should take radical steps to
deal with poverty, racial inequality, & to end the war in
Vietnam.
• Protestors constantly picketed the White House,
accusing the president of heartlessly sending young US
men to die in the jungles of Southeast Asia.

30. • The Kent State shootings (also known as the May 4
massacre or the Kent State massacre) occurred at Kent State
University in Kent, Ohio, in the United States and involved the
shooting of unarmed college students by the Ohio National
Guard on Monday, May 4, 1970. The guardsmen fired 67
rounds over a period of 13 seconds, killing four students and
wounding nine others, one of whom suffered
permanent paralysis.
• Some of the students who were shot had been protesting
the invasion of Cambodia, which President Richard Nixon
announced during a television address on April 30. Other
students who were shot had been walking nearby or observing
the protest from a distance.
• There was a significant national response to the shootings:
hundreds of universities, colleges, and high schools closed
throughout the United States due to a student strike of four
million students, and the event further affected public
opinion—at an already socially contentious time—over the role
of the United States in the Vietnam War.

31. • May 1960, an American U2 spy plane was shot down
over the Soviet Union.
• At first, the US denied it conducted spying missions on
the Soviet Union BUT when the Soviets produced
evidence, Eisenhower had to acknowledge the report as
accurate.
• The president took responsibility but refused to apologize
for spying further infuriating Khrushchev and damaging
the US/Soviet relationship.