Toward Victory

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Objectives

• Learn how the Allies were finally able to defeat
  Germany.
• Discover how a powerful new weapon brought the
  war in the Pacific to a close.
• Explore the horrors of the Holocaust.
• Understand the consequences faced by captured
  enemy leaders.

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Terms and People

• Harry S. Truman Roosevelts vice president
  became president when Roosevelt died in 1945
• island hopping a strategy in which American
  forces would capture some Japanese-held islands
  and go around others
• kamikaze Japanese missions that ended when
  suicide pilots crashed their planes into American
  ships

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Terms and People (continued)

• genocide the deliberate attempt to wipe out an
  entire nation or group of people
• war crimes wartime acts of cruelty and
  brutality that are judged to be beyond the
  accepted rules of war and human behavior

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How did the Allies win World War II and what were
the results?
By mid-1942, the Allies had begun to turn back
Axis advances in the Pacific, North Africa, and
Europe.
Ultimately, the Allies were victorious, and after
the war, the U.S. took the lead in a new global
conflictthe Cold War.
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In 1943, Russia was bearing the brunt of the Nazi
assault, and Stalin urged the U.S. and Britain to
take the pressure off by invading France.
But Roosevelt and Churchill did not think their
forces were ready for that difficult task.
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Instead, they chose the more realistic goal of
removing Italy from the war.
American and British troops crossed the
Mediterranean Sea and took control of the island
of Sicily.
Italy surrendered to the Allies.
However, German troops in Italy continued to
fight, and the Allies faced a long struggle
before they finally controlled Italy.
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In 1944, the Allies under General Eisenhower were
ready to invade France.
On June 6, 1944 known as D-Daymore than 155,000
American, British, and Canadian troops crossed
the English channel and landed on five beaches
at Normandy, France.
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Troops at four of the beaches quickly overcame
German opposition, but 2,500 American soldiers
died fighting the fierce German defense at Omaha
Beach.
D-Day was a success, and on August 25, 1944, the
Allies liberated Paris.
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Allied forces pushed eastward into Belgium.
German troops created a bulge in the American
lines.
However, since the Germans were short on supplies
and soldiers, they failed to break through the
lines.
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While the Allied armies advanced on the ground,
their planes bombed German industries and cities.
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On April 16, Soviet troops began an assault on
Berlin.
Hitler hid in a bunker beneath the citys
streets, where he committed suicide.
A week later, Germany unconditionally surrendered
at Eisenhowers headquarters in France.
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The Battle of Midway halted Japans advance in
the Pacific, and now the Americans went on the
offensive.
American commanders adopted a strategy known as
island-hopping.
Americans fought grueling battles as well as
hunger and disease until they controlled each
island.
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Navajo soldiers made a key contribution to the
island-hopping strategy.
Using their own language, these code-talkers
radioed vital messages from island to island.
The Japanese intercepted the messages but were
unable to understand the rare Navajo language.
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In January 1945, MacArthur fulfilled his promise
to return to the Philippines when army units
landed on Luzon and then advanced on Manila.
A month later, the Americans had taken control of
the city.
Island-hoppers approached Japan, stopping at Iwo
Jima in February and Okinawa in April.
About 18,000 Americans soldiers died securing the
two islands.
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During the battles, the Japanese displayed their
willingness to die rather than surrender.
These events convinced American leaders that only
a full-scale invasion of Japans home islands
would force a surrender.
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Yet Japanese leaders still talked of winning the
war.
President Trumans military advisers warned him
that an invasion of Japan might cost 500,000
American casualties.
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In July, Truman learned that the U.S. had
successfully tested an atomic bomb in the New
Mexico desert.
On August 6, an American plane dropped an atomic
bomb on Hiroshima.
Within minutes, more than 130,000 people died.
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Still, the Japanese refused to surrender.
On August 9, the U.S. dropped a second atomic
bomb on the city of Nagasaki, and 35,000 people
died instantly.
Many more in both cities would die slower deaths
from radiation poisoning.
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World War II was over at last.
It had been the bloodiest war in history, with 60
million dead. Two-thirds of those who died were
civilians.
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During the war, Hitler tried to annihilate all
the Jews in Europe.
Entire families were wiped out in a genocide
known today as the Holocaust.
The Nazis also killed millions of Poles, Slavs,
Roma, communists, people with physical and mental
disabilities, and others.
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The Nazis built six death camps in Poland and
transported millions of people to them in railway
cattle cars.

• Hundreds at a time were killed in gas chambers.

• Others were subjected to torture or horrifying
  medical experiments.

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As Allied soldiers liberated the death camps,
they were shocked by the piles of corpses.
The survivors were living skeletons.
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For the first time in history, war victors
prosecuted leaders of the losing side for war
crimes.
In Nuremberg, Germany, Allied judges tried
prominent Nazis for starting World War II and for
the horrors of the death camps.
Similar trials were held in Manila and Tokyo to
try leaders of the Japanese war machine.
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