US moves toward War

“Great Arsenal of Democracy”  Can’t tame a tiger to a kitten by petting it  US intends to use force  Lend-Lease/Cash-Carry  Aid to USSR and Stalin  1941-Hitler breaks agreement and attacks USSR  FDR ‘enemy of an enemy is a friend’  Churchill- would work with devil himself

Inching toward an Allied power  Atlantic Charter-FDR won’t declare war, but lets Brit know who the US supports  U.S. destroyer Greer shot at by Germans  Shoot on sight  Germany sinks Reuben James  “America has been attacked. The shooting has started. And history has recorded who fired the first shot.”

Japan  Tojo- control of East Asia possible as colonies fall  US only remaining hurdle  US cuts trade from Japan after Indochina attacked  Peace talks  Tojo and emperor Hirohito discuss remaining at peace with US  Tojo soon begins planning attack, however

Pearl Harbor  US aware of attack, but not date  Talks of peace halt on Dec. 6  Early the next morning, attacks begin on Pearl Harbor  Why???

The attack  180+ Japanese planes  Air raid on Pearl Harbor, this is not a drill  Nearly an hour ½ of attacks w/o antiaircraft fire…why?  Sunday morning  Some areas prepping for inspection  Confused as drill  Message not taken seriously enough

 By 9:30 am attack was over  2,403 killed and 1,178 wounded  21 ships damaged or sunk and more than 300 aircraft damaged or destroyed  Aircraft carriers were at sea, luckily for US  Amounts to all of the losses suffered by the Navy from WWI

Reaction  Outrage and panic  “I never wanted to fight this war on two fronts” FDR  Addressed congress on Dec 8- delivers “a date that will live infamy” speech  Declaration of war approved for war on Japan  Three days later, Ger and Italy declare on US

Joining the war Effort AAAAmericans joined the war effort in several ways CCCChoice MMMMen-enlisted in the military (roughly 5 million) WWWWomen’s Auxiliary Army Corps (WAAC) WWWWomen soldiers w/ a salary-nurses, pilots, office jobs, ambulance drivers RRRRequired DDDDraft-10 million men needed for war effort AAAAll recruits then trained for 8 weeks

Minorities  Fighting for the US  Some minorities saw this as fruitless, why fight for a nation that will not treat them as a citizen when they return, if they return  “Here lies a black man killed fighting a yellow man for the protection of a white man.”

Minorities Cont.  300,000 Mexican Americans would fight in the war  13,000 and 33,000 Chinese and Japanese Americans, respectively, became GIs  Japanese used as translators  25,000 N. Americans (800 women) enlisted  “We would not need the Selective Service Act if we all volunteered like Indians.”

Industry  Gov’t  Cars taken off the market-victory trim  Auto plants convert to tanks, planes, etc  Pencil and soda-pop factories now produce bombs and ammunition  FDR-executive order to hire more minorities  Caused by A. Philip Randolph’s march on Washington, DC with 100,000 African Americans  75% of companies hired zero minorities before the war

 Manhattan Project  Creates hundreds to thousands of jobs for scientists and laborers alike  Will lead to creation of the atom bomb as well  Office of Price Admin.  Freezes prices on goods to control wartime inflation  War Production Board  Controlled the switch of industries to wartime

Minorities in Industry  Increase in minorities in the workforce due to lack of white, males  Women still hired more often than minority workers  Early on, both groups thought to be unfit for the physical labor-many predicted too few workers  By 1941 there were 18 million working in the US and climbing

Government and people  Groups had to work together  War bonds  Money given to the government from its citizens. The money is then paid back to the buyer at a decided date. Good idea?\  Rationing  Similar to the stoppage of cars, food were rationed with food allotments per family  People saw this as a way to do their part- Victory Gardens