1. Topic: Evaluating how the United States won a Multi-Front War
Do Now:
Which do you feel was more vital to American interest- the Pacific Theater or the European Theater?
Use specifics when justifying your answer.

2. The Axis on the Attack Allies “space for time”
Japan seizes American and British possessions in the Pacific
Macarthur & the Philippines
Bataan Death March
Hitler seizes most of Europe
Collaborators and resisters
The “Final Solution” and America’s response
Hitler’s big mistake at Stalingrad

3. America in Europe American and British forces in Africa
America invades Italy
Failure?
Stalin demands a “Second Front”
Gen. Eisenhower in charge of Allied forces, plans 2nd front
D-Day: 6/6/44 (Overlord)
Normandy, France
August- Paris liberated
Meanwhile, Soviets push into Eastern Europe
Election 1944 (FDR vs. Dewey)
FDR 4th Term
VP Truman selected
Germany invaded
“Strategic Bombing” of Germany (Dresden)
Battle of the Bulge
US/UK from west, USSR from East
April 30, 1945: Soviet troops in Berlin
Hitler’s suicide
May 8: Germany Surrenders (VE Day)

4. European War Map

5. The Pacific Theater of Operations
Turning point: Battle of Midway (Nimitz)
Island Hopping and superior air power
MacArthur and the Philippines (1944)
Iwo Jima (March ’45)
Potsdam Declaration
August 1945: Atomic Bomb dropped on Japan
Hiroshima and Nagasaki
Japan surrenders, but keeps the Emperor

6. Pacific War Map

7. Conclusion
“It was the Soviet Union, not the United States, which truly won World War II”.
Assess the validity of this statement