The Second World War, c. 1938–1945

This is Unit Twelve, part one, on the road to the Second World War and the home front. Unit Eleven closed on whom the New Deal left out, and carried those questions into the Second World War. Carry one habit from earlier units: compare what a policy claimed with what it did. From nineteen thirty-five the United States claimed neutrality at every step, and moved toward war at every step. At the end of that sequence the course reads it whole. Then watch a threatened march win a federal order against job discrimination. By the end you will be able to explain how fascism and militarism rose in Italy, Germany and Japan. To trace the steps from neutrality toward war. To put Pearl Harbor and the declarations of war in the right order. To describe how the home front was organised. And to explain what Executive Order eighty-eight oh two did and did not do.

Five entries on the rise of fascism in Italy and Germany, and of militarism in Japan.

Italy.

USH2 1651 Mussolini's Fascism

In nineteen nineteen Benito Mussolini founded the Fasci Italiani di Combattimento, feeding on Italians' sense that Versailles had betrayed them, what the Yawp calls a mutilated victory, a second-tier reward for fighting on the winning side. In nineteen thirty-five, in defiance of the League of Nations, Mussolini invaded Ethiopia, the Yawp records.

Germany.

USH2 1652 Hitler Takes Power

In January nineteen thirty-three President Paul von Hindenburg appointed Adolf Hitler chancellor, urged on by industrialists who feared a Communist uprising, the anchor says, and the Enabling Act of that March gave Hitler power to make all laws for four years. Roosevelt took office that same March: one Depression, two answers.

The laws against Germany's Jews.

USH2 1653 The Nuremberg Laws

In nineteen thirty-five the Nuremberg Laws stripped German Jews, whom Hitler blamed for Germany's defeat, of their citizenship and its rights, as the Nazis smashed democratic traditions and swiftly conquered German institutions, in the Yawp's description. The anchor dates the first camp, Dachau, to nineteen thirty-three; the Holocaust entries later in this unit begin there.

Japan.

USH2 1654 Japan Takes Manchuria

On September eighteenth, nineteen thirty-one, a railway explosion in Manchuria gave Japan's army its pretext for invasion, the Yawp records, and the puppet state of Manchukuo was carved from China's three northernmost provinces. The anchor dates Manchukuo to nineteen thirty-one; the Yawp places it after the conquest was complete in February nineteen thirty-two. Unit ten's Stimson Doctrine refused to recognise it.

The war in China.

USH2 1655 War in China

In July nineteen thirty-seven a clash at the Marco Polo Bridge led Japan into full-scale invasion of China, and Nanjing was sacked in December, with between two hundred fifty and three hundred thousand people killed, the Yawp records. It says the war begun in Manchuria lasted thirteen years and claimed over thirty-five million lives.

Eight entries on how the United States claimed neutrality at every step while moving toward war, and the eighth reads the sequence whole.

How Congress tried to stay out.

USH2 1656 The Neutrality Acts

Congress passed Neutrality Acts banning arms sales to warring nations in nineteen thirty-five and loans to them in nineteen thirty-six, and the Act of nineteen thirty-seven barred American ships from carrying weapons or passengers to belligerents. The same year as the first Act, the Yawp adds, the Senate rejected joining the World Court.

The war in Europe.

USH2 1657 War in Europe

On September first, nineteen thirty-nine, Germany invaded Poland, secretly divided with the Soviet Union, and Britain and France declared war two days later. France was defeated in six weeks in nineteen forty, then Germany bombed England, and in June nineteen forty-one Hitler broke his pact and invaded the Soviet Union, the anchor records.

The first American aid to Britain.

USH2 1658 Destroyers for Bases

In nineteen forty Roosevelt gave Britain fifty destroyers in exchange for ninety-nine-year leases on British bases in the Caribbean and Newfoundland, the National Archives records, after Churchill's plea that Britain had lost eleven destroyers in ten days. The anchor does not carry the deal. In that year's campaign, the Archives adds, Roosevelt promised to keep America out of the war.

The Four Freedoms.

USH2 1659 The Four Freedoms

On January sixth, nineteen forty-one, Roosevelt told Congress that the world he sought would rest on four freedoms: of speech, of worship, from want and from fear, and asked Americans to produce arms for the democracies, pay higher taxes and accept wartime sacrifice. The National Archives preserves the address; the anchor does not name it.

Lend-Lease.

USH2 1660 Lend-Lease

The Lend-Lease Act of March eleventh, nineteen forty-one, let the United States lend or lease war supplies to nations whose defence it deemed vital, some forty-five billion dollars' worth by nineteen forty-five, shared among the Soviet Union, Britain, China and other allies. The Yawp says America still claimed neutrality while giving direct material support to the Allies.

The Atlantic Charter.

USH2 1661 The Atlantic Charter

In August nineteen forty-one Roosevelt and Churchill met off Newfoundland and drafted the Atlantic Charter, renouncing territorial gain, promising self-determination, and pledging, in the Yawp's quotation, the final destruction of Nazi tyranny. Its aims echo the Fourteen Points of unit eight. The United States was not yet at war.

The embargo on Japan.

USH2 1662 Embargo on Japan

Beginning with the Export Control Act of July nineteen forty, the United States embargoed shipments to Japan, first aviation gasoline and machine tools, then scrap iron and steel, with new embargoes in August nineteen forty-one. The Yawp notes that Japan's leaders saw resource-rich conquests as the answer to their nation's lack of raw materials.

What the whole sequence amounted to.

USH2 1663 Neutral in Name

From nineteen thirty-five to nineteen forty-one the United States claimed neutrality at every step while moving toward war. The Neutrality Acts banned arms sales, loans and American shipping to belligerents. After Germany invaded Poland, Roosevelt won cash and carry, letting the Allies buy arms if they paid cash and carried the goods on their own ships. Then came fifty destroyers for British bases, the embargo on Japan, Lend-Lease, and a joint charter of war aims with Britain. The misreading is that the United States stayed neutral until Pearl Harbor. By the Yawp's account it was giving the Allies direct material support months before, while American soldiers were not yet fighting.

Three entries on the attack, the declaration, and the order in which the world war joined.

Pearl Harbor.

USH2 1664 Pearl Harbor

At seven forty-eight on the morning of December seventh, nineteen forty-one, Japanese aircraft attacked the American fleet at Pearl Harbor, hitting all eight battleships in the harbour, sinking four, and destroying nearly two hundred aircraft on the ground. Twenty-four hundred Americans were killed, the anchor and the Yawp agree. Japan also struck Hong Kong and the Philippines.

The declaration of war.

USH2 1665 A Date Which Will Live in Infamy

On December eighth Roosevelt asked Congress to declare war, calling December seventh a date which will live in infamy, and Congress declared war the same day, in the address the National Archives preserves. The Yawp says American isolationism fell at Pearl Harbor.

The war with Germany.

USH2 1666 Germany Declares War

On December eleventh, nineteen forty-one, Germany, and Italy with it, declared war on the United States, honouring their alliance with Japan, and within a week, the Yawp says, separate conflicts had become one world war. The order is often reversed. The United States did not declare war on Germany first; Germany declared war on the United States.

Five entries on the home front: factories, the draft, rationing, and women at work and in uniform.

The war economy.

USH2 1667 The Arsenal

In August nineteen forty Congress created the Defense Plant Corporation, which built three hundred forty-four plants in the West by nineteen forty-five, and corporate profits rose from six point four billion dollars in nineteen forty to nearly eleven billion in nineteen forty-four, the anchor records. The Yawp says war production pulled America out of the Great Depression, unit eleven's open question.

The draft.

USH2 1668 The Draft

About fifty million men registered for the draft during the war, and ten million were inducted, among them more than a million Black service members in segregated units, in the Yawp's words a Jim Crow institution. The anchor counts two and a half million African Americans registered and one million who served.

Rationing.

USH2 1669 Rationing and Bonds

The Office of Price Administration, created in April nineteen forty-one, regulated prices and fought inflation, with ration books for meat, coffee, butter, sugar, shoes, liquor, cigarettes and gasoline, and millions of Americans bought more than one hundred eighty-five billion dollars in war bonds. Unit eight's Food Administration had asked for voluntary thrift; this war set prices by law.

Women at work.

USH2 1670 Women at Work

By nineteen forty-three women made up a majority of the aircraft industry's workers, moving into jobs once thought reserved for men, and Rosie the Riveter in coveralls and a kerchief came, the Yawp says, to stand for their factory labour. By nineteen forty-four a third of women defence workers were mothers, and federal childcare had begun in nineteen forty-two.

Women in uniform.

USH2 1671 Women in Uniform

Over three hundred fifty thousand women served in the military's all-female units, the Yawp records, with Black women admitted only to the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps and the Nurse Corps Reserves, under a ten percent quota. After the war, the Yawp says, most women left the workforce or lost their jobs as the men returned.

Two entries to close the part: a march threatened, and the order that called it off.

A threatened march.

USH2 1672 Randolph's Threat

In early nineteen forty-one A. Philip Randolph, president of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, threatened to lead a march on Washington against discrimination in defence jobs, promising, in the National Archives' account, ten, twenty, fifty thousand Negroes on the White House lawn. Defence contractors still refused to hire Black workers and the armed forces remained segregated, the Yawp says.

The order that called the march off.

USH2 1673 Executive Order Eighty-Eight Oh Two

On June twenty-fifth, nineteen forty-one, Roosevelt issued Executive Order eighty-eight oh two, and Randolph called off the march. The order declared that there shall be no discrimination in the employment of workers in defense industries and in Government, because of race, creed, color, or national origin, and it created the Fair Employment Practices Committee to enforce the rule. The concession was real and limited: the Yawp records that factory supervisors often relegated Black women to the most menial tasks, and the armed forces stayed segregated. The order became a precedent. Unit thirteen shows President Truman going further in nineteen forty-eight, and Randolph would drive the March on Washington of nineteen sixty-three.

Look at what you can now do. You can explain how fascism and militarism rose: Mussolini on a mutilated victory, Hitler's Enabling Act and the Nuremberg Laws, and Japan in Manchuria and China. You can trace the steps from neutrality toward war: the Neutrality Acts, cash and carry, destroyers for bases, Lend-Lease, the Atlantic Charter and the embargo on Japan, each taken while neutrality was claimed. You can put the declarations in order. Japan attacked on December seventh, Congress declared war on December eighth, and Germany declared war on the United States on December eleventh. You can describe the home front: new plants, ten million drafted into a segregated military, ration books and bonds, and women in the aircraft plants and in uniform. And you can explain what Executive Order eighty-eight oh two did, banning discrimination in defence employment, and what it did not do: it left the armed forces segregated.