Chapter 11 Section 4: World War II  ESSENTIAL QUESTION How did World War II affect Georgians?

Increasing Tensions  Dictator: individual who ruled a country through military strength CountryLeaderQuick Facts JapanEmperor Hirohito Attacked China seeking raw materials ItalyMussoliniAttacked Ethiopia and Albania GermanyAdolf HitlerNazi leader; began rebuilding military forces, persecuting Jews, and silencing opponents Soviet Union Josef StalinBuilt up industry and military, forced peasants into collective farms, eliminated opponents

The War Begins  1938: Hitler’s Germany attacks France to “take back” land lost in WWI (Rhineland)  Sent troops to take over Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Poland  Great Britain and France declared war  Soviet Union invaded nearby countries and agreed to split Poland with Germany  By 1940, Hitler controlled Denmark, Norway, Holland, Belgium, Luxembourg and a large part of France and began bombing Great Britain

A Neutral United States  Most Americans did not want to get involved in the war, but Roosevelt wanted to help Britain  Hitler turned on Stalin in 1941 and invaded the Soviet Union  Lend-lease: policy to lend or lease (rent) weapons to Great Britain and the Soviet Union  American ships began escorting British ships in convoys

Lend-Lease  Japan, Italy, the Soviet Union, and Germany were fighting Great Britain  Most Americans felt the U.S. should not get involved  1930’s Congress had passed “neutrality acts” to keep the U.S. out of another war (we could not sell weapons to any warring nation)  1939 FDR got Congress to pass a new law that allowed the Allied Powers to buy arms if they paid cash and carried them in their ships

Lend-Lease (continued)  1940 FDR gave Great Britain old weapons and traded 50 destroyers for British bases in the Western Hemisphere  1941 British ran out of $ so Congress let FDR “lend or lease” arms to them  Germany “turned” on the Soviet Union and invaded them so FDR gave lend-lease aid to the Soviets  FDR built air bases in Greenland and Iceland. The planes from these bases tracked German submarines.  U.S. Navy escorted British ships part of the way across the Atlantic

“A Day that Will Live in Infamy”  President Roosevelt stopped exports to Japan to protest its expansion into other countries  Exports of oil, airplanes, aviation gasoline and metals were stopped  The Japanese attacked the U.S. Navy fleet at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on Dec. 7, 1941  Japan hoped to destroy the fleet giving them control of the Pacific Ocean  The USA declared war on Japan  Allied Powers: USA, Great Britain, Soviet Union  Axis Powers: Germany, Italy, Japan

Pearl Harbor  Japanese-American relations got worse  U.S. stopped exporting planes, metals, aircraft parts, and aviation gas to Japan  1941 Japan invaded French Indochina- FDR seized all Japanese property in U.S.  Late 1941 Japan decided to invade Indonesia to get gas  U.S. Navy stationed at Pearl Harbor were the only ones that could stop them

Pearl Harbor (continued)  Dec. 7, 1941 Sunday morning 8:00 AM the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor  8 battleships destroyed or damaged  More than 180 planes were destroyed  Over 2,000 people killed/over 1,000 wounded  “day that will live in infamy”  Dec. 8 Congress declared war on Japan

American Military Forces  Millions of Americans enlisted after the attack on Pearl Harbor  330,000 women joined – could not serve in combat roles  Segregation in the military kept African American and white service men in different units  Tuskegee Airmen: famous African American flyers of the Army Air Force

U.S. enters World War II  Allied Powers-U.S., Great Britain, and the Soviet Union  Axis Powers-Germany, Japan, and Italy  U.S. fighting on two fronts-Germany and Italy in Europe and Africa and Japan in the Pacific

The War in Europe  : British and American troops won control of Africa  1943: Mussolini overthrown and Italy joined the Allies  American general Dwight D. Eisenhower coordinated plan to recapture Europe  D-Day: June 6, 1944 – Allied forces land in northern France  Early 1945: Germans pushed out of France  April 1945: Soviet and American troops meet and Germany surrenders – Hitler commits suicide

Georgia Loses a Friend  President Roosevelt visited Georgia often at his “Little White House” in Warm Springs  His polio symptoms were eased in the mineral springs  April 24, 1945: President Roosevelt died suddenly of a stroke in Warm Springs, GA  Millions of Georgians and Americans mourned  Vice President Harry Truman became president

FDR’s Impact on Georgia  Got Congress to pass laws to protect workers  ND created the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) which created Blue Ridge Lake, Lake Chatuge, and Lake Nottely  FDR’s body was carried by train to Washington as thousands of crying Georgians lined the tracks

The War in the Pacific  1942: Japan expanded its territory throughout the Asian Pacific region  1945: Allied forces began to retake Japanese controlled lands  Japan refused to surrender  President Truman authorized the use of atomic bombs to force Japan’s surrender  Enola Gay: plane that dropped first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan  Japan surrendered after a second atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki  Over 50 million people died in the war

The Holocaust  The Holocaust: name given to the Nazi plan to kill all Jewish people  Auschwitz, Buckenwald, Dachau, Treblinka, Bergen-Belsen infamous concentration camps where Jews and others were executed  6 million people killed in the Holocaust (Picture: Jews at the Warsaw Ghetto)

The Holocaust  Spring 1945-Allied troops pushed into Poland, Austria, and Germany  They found Auschwitz, Buckenwald, Dachau, Treblinka, Bergen-Belsen (concentration camps) set up by the Nazis as the “final solution to the Jewish problem”  Those alive were emaciated skeletons from years of starvation, disease, cruel treatment, forced labor, and medical experiments  “systematic extermination (killing) of 6 million Jews”  5-6 million others labeled as “undesirables” were also killed by the Nazis

The Holocaust (continued)  Prisoners, including children, were gassed in chambers they thought were showers  Their bodies were incinerated in huge ovens or thrown into mass graves  Hitler wanted to rid the world of “inferior” people including Jews, Poles, Czechs, Russians, Gypsies, homosexuals, and the mentally or physically disabled  1986 the GA Commission on the Holocaust was established  The Commission fosters tolerance, good citizenship and character development among the young people of GA  Annual art and writing contest for middle and high school students

The War’s Effects on Society  Everyone was expected to help in the war effort  Women began working in jobs to replace men who had gone to war  G.I. Bill: law to help returning soldiers adapt to civilian life Low cost loans for homes or business College education opportunities  Women and African Americans did not want to go back to the kind of life they had before the war

Georgia During World War II  320,000 Georgians joined the armed forces – over 7,000 killed  Military bases were built in the state which improved the economy  Farmers grew needed crops – income tripled for the average farmer  Limits were put on the consumption of goods such as gasoline, meat, butter, and sugar (rationing)  Students were encouraged to buy war bonds and defense stamps to pay for the war  Victory Garden: small family gardens to make sure soldiers would have enough food  POW (prisoner of war) camps in Georgia at some military bases

Bell Aircraft  Needed to build aircraft plants to build more B-29 bombers  Bell Aircraft Co. of Buffalo, N.Y. got the contract for a new plant in Marietta  Largest aircraft assembly plant in the world with 4.2 million square feet  1943 they began assembling bombers with 1200 employees  ,000 employees making planes a month  1950 Lockheed Aircraft Corp. reopened the plant

Military Bases  WW II brought millions of federal $ to GA strengthening the economy Major Bases in GA:  Fort Benning (Columbus) largest infantry center in U.S.  Camp Gordon (Augusta)  Fort Stewart/Hunter Air Field (Savannah)  Warner Robins Air Field (near Macon)  Glynco Naval Air Station (Brunswick) flew blimps to search for German submarines

Military Bases (continued)  Fort McPherson (Atlanta) induction center for newly drafted soldiers  Fort Gillem (Clayton County) army storage facility and railroad yard  Prisoners of war (POWs) were held at Forts Benning, Gordon, Oglethorpe, and Stewart  At Fort Oglethorpe, 150,000 women (Women’s Army Auxiliary Corp-WACs) trained to become postal workers, clerks, typists, switchboard operators, code clerks, and drivers or aides  Atlanta Airport became an air base in 1941

Savannah Shipyard  Built “Liberty” ships (named after Patrick Henry’s famous quote)  Nov launched first Liberty ship-the U.S.S. James Oglethorpe (sunk by a German sub in 1943)  88 Liberty ships built by 15,000 workers, many of whom were women

Brunswick Shipyard  over 16,000 men and women worked around the clock on 6 ships at a time  1944 set a record by building 7 ships in just one month  Worked on Christmas day and donated $ for that day to the war effort  Produced 99 Liberty ships

Richard B. Russell, Jr.  June 1931, Winder resident Richard Russell became GA’s youngest governor in the 20 th Century  Sworn in by his dad, GA Supreme Court Justice, Richard B. Russell, Sr.  Former member and speaker of the GA House of Representatives  Combined 102 state offices into 17 agencies  Combined the boards of trustees of state colleges and universities into one governing group-the Board of Regents of the Univ. System

Richard B. Russell, Jr. (continued)  Gov. Russell tried to run the state like a successful business  1932 he was elected to the U.S. Senate (served for 38 years)  He favored national military preparedness and states’ rights  Served on the Senate Appropriations Com  Co-sponsored legislation to provide a school lunch to all children  Advisor to 6 U.S. Presidents  Served as president pro tempore of the Senate (third in line for the presidency)

Richard Russell, Jr. Carl Vinson

 U.S. House of Representatives (served 25 consecutive terms from )  Promoted a strong national defense  1934 Vinson-Trammel Act (manufactured 92 warships)  Law to expand naval aviation system to 10,000 planes,16,000 pilots, and 20 air bases  Law to ease labor restrictions in shipbuilding to allow faster construction of navy ships

Carl Vinson (continued) After World War II:  Wanted a strong defense throughout the Cold War with the Soviet Union  1964-President Johnson awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom  Retired to his Milledgeville farm in 1965  1972-President Nixon named the 3 rd nuclear carrier for him  He died in 1981

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