WWII Terms Chapter 35

  1. "double V slogan": V for victory over fascism and V for victory for equality at home; encouraged African Americans
  2. Adolf Hitler: leader of the German Nazi Party
  3. America First Committee: formed by isolationists who feared FDR's pro-British policies; formed in effort to mobilize American pro-war opinion and warned against getting involved AGAIN
  4. Appeasement: allowing small acts of aggression and expansion to happen in hopes to avoid conflict. Examples: Ethiopia-Mussolini conquered after a year , Rhineland-Hitler ordered troops to march on the permanently "demilitarized" ground, China-U.S. gunboat bombed and sunk by Japanese planes, Sudetenland-conquered by Hitler because he believed he had the right because most of the people spoke German
  5. Atlantic Charter: document by Winston Churchill and FDR that affirmed their peace goals for the end of the war; agreed that general peace principles included self-determination for everyone, no territorial expansion, and free trade
  6. atomic bomb: weapon whose power came from splitting of the atom; dropped on Hiroshima on August 6, Nagasaki on August 9
  7. Axis powers: consisted of Germany and Italy. (Japan joined later)
  8. Battle of Midway: the interception of Japanese messages that enabled U.S. forces to destroy 4 Japanese carriers and 300 planes
  9. Battle of the Atlantic: naval war between Germany and Britain and Americans to control the shipping lanes
  10. Battle of the Bulge: German counterattack in response to D Day; setback Americans
  1. Benito Mussolini: leader of the Italian Fascist party
  2. Big Three: leaders of the U.S.-FDR, Soviet Union-Stalin, and Great Britain-Churchill
  3. blitzkrieg: type of warfare used by Germany in Poland; overwhelming use of air power and fast-moving tanks
  4. cash and carry: less restrictive neutrality act that provided a belligerent could buy U.S. arms if it used its own ship and paid in cash; was neutral, but favored Britain
  5. Chester Nimitz: proposed that strategy of "island-hopping"-bypasses strongly held Japanese islands and isolated them with naval and air power; allowed Allies to quickly move in on Japan
  6. Cordell Hull: he suggested a plan that gave the president power to lower tariffs up to 50% for nations that reciprocated with comparable reductions for U.S imports
  7. Cuba: Congress nullified the Platt Amendment for this country, but the U.S. kept its right to have a naval base at Guantanamo Bay
  8. D Day: Under the demand of Eisenhower, U.S., British, and Canadian forces secured many beach heads on the Normandy coast; liberated Paris
  9. destroyers-for-bases deal: trade between Britain and U.S. in which Britain got 50 old U.S. destroyers in exchange for giving the U.S. the right to build a military base in the Caribbean (British islands)
  10. Douglas MacArthur: commanded armies in the Pacific; vowed to return to the Philippines
  11. Dwight Eisenhower: leader of Operation Touch who succeeded in taking North Africa from Germany in 1943
  12. Fascism: the idea that people should glorify their nation and their race through an aggressive show of force
  1. 7th Pan-American Conference 1933: FDR's repudiation of TR's corollary to the Monroe Doctrine, stating good neighbor policy towards L. American countries
  2. Adolf Hitler: Fascist leader of Germany; started WWII under the "big lie"- belief that GER was stabbed in the back by Jews in WWI
  3. America First Committee: headed by Charles Lindbergh; isolationist group advocating that US focus on continental defense and non-involvement with WWII
  4. appeasement: term for the British-French policy of attempting to prevent war by granting German demands
  5. Ardennes: thick forest on the border of France and Germany
  6. Atlantic Charter 1941: US.-GB agreement of Aug 1941 to promote democracy and intentions for improvement post WWII; created by Winston Churchill and FDR in a secret conference
  7. Bases for Destroyers deal: Sept. 1940- British gives US 8 base sites from Newfoundland to S. America; US trades destroyers;
  8. Battle of Britain: July 1940-Dec 1941; air war between GER and GB
  9. Beer Hall Putsch: Nazi party failed attempt to seize Munich govt 1923; Hitler emerges as a national hero when jailed
  10. Benito Mussolini: Fascist dictator of Italy; sought to recreate a Roman empire; allied with Hitler in Roman-Berlin Axis; invaded Ethiopia; "Benevolent Dictator"
  11. Blitzkreig: "lightning war"; German military warfare tactic

12.  burning house analogy: used by FDR in one of his fireside chats to persuade Americans to support Lend Lease Policy

13.  cash-and-carry policy: aka Neutrality Act of 1939; Euro nations (Allies) can buy war materials from US only if they provide transportation and pay in cash

14.  Charles Lindbergh: leader of America First Committee; chief spokesman for US isolationism

  1. Committee to Defend America by Aiding the Allies: group advocating US support for GB in the fight against Hitler
  1. Conscription law 1940: first peacetime draft; trained 1.2 million troops
  2. Cordell Hull: FDR's Sec'ry of State who promoted Reciprocal Trade Agreement, low tariffs, and Good Neighbor policy
  3. Czechoslovakia: Democratic nation betrayed at Munich Conference
  4. Dec 7, 1941: Pearl harbor attack; holiday time, Sunday morning
  5. Ethiopia: African nation invaded by Mussolini in 1935
  6. France: seized by Hitler in 1940; pushed the US closer to direct aid to GB
  7. Gen. Franco: Fascist rebel leader against Spanish Loyalist gov't; helped by Hitler and Mussolini to become dictator of Spain
  8. Gerald Nye: instigator of 1934 Senate hearings that castigated WWI munitions manufacturers as "merchants of death"
  9. Good Neighbor Policy: established and reinforced by FDR to create good relations with L. America; nullified Roosevelt Corollary
  10. Havana Conference: meeting where US warned Germany that it could not take over orphan colonies in the Americas
  11. Iceland: nation near whose waters US destroyers, namely USS Kearny, came under Nazi submarine attack
  1. Japan: nation that acted against the Washington Naval Treaty in 1934 and walked out of London Conference
  2. Johnson Debt Default Act 1934: forbade any country that still owed US money from borrowing any more cash
  3. Joseph Stalin: Russian dictator who first helped Hitler destroy Poland before becoming victim of Nazi aggression in 1941; transformed RUS into a military power in 15 years
  4. Kulaks: independent farmers; Stalin ordered Collective Farming (crops go to Russian gov't)
  5. Lend-Lease Act 1941: law that made the US the "arsenal for democracy" by providing supposedly temporary military material assistance to GB
  6. London Conference 1933: International economic conference on stabilizing currency to solve Great Depression
  7. luftwaffe: German air force
  8. Maginot line: France's wall of defense that only faced Germany and stopped at the Ardennes
  9. Munich Conference 1938: European diplomatic conf where GB and FR appease Hitler's demands for Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia
  10. Nazi-Soviet Pact 1939: Hitler-Stalin Nonaggression Pact; 10-year peace treaty; Russia can keep 1/3 of Poland when Hitler attacks it
  11. Neutrality Acts of 1935,1937: prohibited sale of arms to belligerents in a war; banned loans to belligerents; citizens cannot travel to countries at war or travel on armed ships; passed to prevent American involvement in future overseas wars
  12. Norway, Denmark, Belgium, Luxembourg, Holland: five "weaker" countries Hitler attacked before France (after phony war)
  1. Nye Committee 1934: formed to investigate whether or not munitions manufacturers and bankers were pro-war in WWI solely to make profit; increased anti-war atmosphere and push to pass Neutrality Acts
  2. Panay: American gunboat bombed and sunk by Japanese in 1937; Japan apologized and sent $ to victims' families; unwilling to go to war, US forgave easily
  3. Pearl Harbor: major American naval base devastated in a surprise attack in Dec 1941
  4. Philippines: nation to which the US promised independence in the Tydings-McDuffie Act of 1934
  5. phony war: term dubbed to the early phase of WWII; period of silence and inactivity in Europe after Hitler moved his forces from Poland and eventually attacked Norway and Denmark
  6. Poland: invaded Sept 1939 by Hitler; set off WWII
  7. Quarantine Speech: Roosevelt's speech 1937 that proposed strong US measures against overseas aggressors (Japan)
  8. radar: initially invented by GB to detect aircraft in the air; eventually used by all belligerent countries in WWII
  9. RAF: British air force
  10. Reciprocal Trade Agreements 1934: designed by Cordell Hull to increase American exports; reversed Hawley-Smoot Tariff by decreasing the tariff
  11. Retreat of Dunkirk: British retreat after Ger attacks France
  12. Rhineland: strip of land demilitarized according to Versailles Treaty; invaded by Hitler
  13. Robin Moor: unarmed US merchant ship torpedoed and destroyed by a German U-boat outside war zone; May 1941
  14. Rome-Berlin Axis: alliance of Hitler and Mussolini
  1. scorch and burn: Russian tactic; used against GER after GER attack June 1941; allowed Ger to conquer land to separate them from supply line and fall in trap of the brutal winter
  2. self-determination, disarmament, freedom of seas, peace of security, League of Nations: 5 specific points of the Atlantic Charter
  3. Soviet Union: communist nation invaded by Hitler in June 1941 that was also aided by American lend-lease
  4. Spanish Civil War 1936-1939: conflict between the revel Fascist forces of Gen. Franco and the Loyalist gov't; severely tested US neutrality; Mussolini and Hitler helped in order to use SP as testing ground for bombs
  5. Sudetenland: piece of land south Czechoslovakia; betrayed by GB and FR to appease Hitler in 1938 Munich Conference
  6. Taft, Dewey: two leading Republican presidential candidate aspirants
  7. Tydings-McDuffie Act 1934: put Philippines on the road to independence
  8. USS Kearny: US destroyer sunk by German U-boats off the coast of Iceland in Oct 1941
  9. Veterans of Future Wars: formed 1936 by a group of Princeton U students; anti-war group that mocked the early payment of bonuses to WWI veterans
  10. Weimar Republic: name of democratic govt of GER 1919-1933
  11. Wendell Willkie: dark horse Rep Presidential nominee in 1940; lost against FDR; attacked FDR for the third term attempt
  12. Winston Churchill: courageous prime minister who led GB's lonely resistance to Hitler; involved with the secret Atlantic Conference
  13. xenophobic: anti-foreign; Japan until the 1840s