HY 103 The Road to World War II

1. Ginger A. Glodowske
MA Secondary Education
Beal College

2.  Once Germany surrendered,
Allied leaders and German
leaders met to discuss peace
terms
 Wilson’s 14 Points
 Rejected … not enough
vengeance and punishment
 Treaty of Versailles
 Final peace plan

3.  Established 9 new nations
 Poland
 Finland
 Austria
 Hungary
 Czechoslovakia
 Yugoslavia
 Estonia
 Latvia
 Lithuania
 Demilitarized Germany
 No more air force or navy
 Army reduced to 100,000
 Demanded reparations from
Germany to Allied nations ($33
billion)
 Included War Guilt Clause …
Germany must take blame for
the war!

4. Europe
BEFORE
WWI

5. Europe
AFTER
WWI

6. Treaty of
Versailles
(unfair
punishment)
Economy
(depression &
expansion)
European
leadership
(from democracy
to dictators)
Appeasement
(backfired)

7.  Did not make the world “safe for democracy” as
Wilson hoped
 Germans thought treaty was unfair
 Soviets (formerly Russians) were upset about their
country being carved up
 War-torn nations were not helped

8.  Germany and Italy
 Thought they were unfairly handicapped by Treaty of
Versailles
 Believed that World War I “winners” controlled world’s
wealth and trading
 Looked for new resources, markets and big armies
 Japan
 World could no longer afford to buy silk
 Looked for new resources, markets and big armies

9. German
breadlines
Japanese children
eating radish roots
during famine

10.  Germans, Italians, Russians and Japanese
blamed democratic leaders for problems
after World War I

11. Mussolini
(Italy)
Stalin
(Russia)
Hitler
(Germany)
Tojo
(Japan)

12.  fascism … a totalitarian
government
 extreme nationalism …
glorifies the state
 one leader and one party
 complete government
control of society
 no toleration of opposition
or protests
 propaganda and
censorship
 invaded Ethiopia (Africa)
 STATE CONTROL … to
create another Roman
Empire

13.  communism … a
totalitarian government
 one leader and one party
 no class divisions …
absolute equality
 complete government
control of society
 government ownership of
property
 no toleration of opposition
or protests
 STATE OWNERSHIP . . .
to create equality

14.  extreme militarism …
military control of the
government
 no toleration of opposition
or protests
 propaganda and
censorship
 wanted control of Pacific
for resources
 occupied Manchuria and
invaded China
 occupied Vietnam
 joined Axis Powers
 suffered from British and
American oil boycotts
 bombed Pearl Harbor

15.  Nazism … a totalitarian government
 one leader and one party
 biological racism and anti-semitism (anti-Jewish)
 anti-Communism
 extreme nationalism
 does not tolerate opposition or protests
 propaganda
 censorship

16. Nationalism
Militarism

17.  Hitler becomes Chancellor
(1933)
 Rose to power as a result of
weakness of previous
government
 Charismatic speaker
(demagogue)
 Blamed Jews and communists
for Germany’s problems
 Promised return of German
pride and success

18.  Mussolini becomes
Prime Minister (1922)
 Changed title to “Il Duce”
by 1925
 Promised to create
another Roman Empire
 Invaded and conquered
Ethiopia in 1935 to
expand Italian Empire
 Along with Hitler,
supported Francisco
Franco in the Spanish
Civil War

19.  Sought total control of Pacific
region
 Mukden Incident (1931, fake
terrorist attack on railway
between Japan and Manchuria)
 Occupied Manchuria
 Nanking Massacre (1936)
 “Rape of Nanking”
 Mass murder, genocide, rape

20.  “Lebensraum”
 Austria
 Sudetenland
 Czechoslovakia
 Poland
 Denmark, Norway, Netherlands, Belgium,
Luxembourg

21.  … the act of giving in to an enemy’s demands in
hopes of avoiding future conflict
 Hitler’s takeover of Sudetenland
 He claimed Germans in this part of
Czechoslovakia were being mistreated, so he
needed to rescue them … after all, the area
belonged to Germany before WWI
 British and French leaders appeased Hitler by
agreeing to the takeover … without talking to
Czech leaders

23.  Summer of 1935 …
 Mussolini prepares to invade Ethiopia to expand
colonial holdings
 US fears another European war
 US Congress creates a system of legal protections
to avoid being drawn into the conflict

24.  1935
 direct response to current European situation
 prohibited all arms shipments to nations at war
 President may warn US citizens against traveling on the ships of warring
nations
 1936
 renewed all of 1935 Act
 1937
 Established “cash and carry” policy — warring nations could purchase non-
military goods from US

25.  August 31
 Hitler invades Poland
 Britain & France honor agreements to declare war
 US clearly favors Britain, France & Allies
 September
 Neutrality Acts revised
 Still prohibited American ships from war zones
 Warring nations could now purchase arms from the US through
“cash and carry”

26. 1940 … Year of the Blitzkrieg
 June
 Mussolini begins fighting alongside Hitler
 Hitler conquers France
 July
 Most Americans see Germany as a direct threat to the US
 September
 US begins drafting soldiers
 December
 Britain is bankrupt and needs help

27.  Allows US to sell and lend (lease) arms to
nations that are declared “vital to the defense
of the United States”
 So … the US can give arms to Britain, as long
as they promise to return them or pay for
them later

28. Theaters of War:
Where WWII Was Fought
Pacific
Asia
North
Africa
Europe
Atlantic
Ocean

29. HITLER’S
WWII
PARTNERS

30. Brazil
India
THE ALLIED
POWERS IN
WWII