World War II Notebook

Seite 1

Day 1 - Stalin's Soviet Union

Stalin's Soviet Union

launched five-year plan to transform Soviet society along socialist lines

From Lenin to Stalin

Lenin & Bolsheviks face economic disintegration, famine, riots, rebellion

New Economic Policy - reestablish economic freedom & rebuild agriculture & industry

could sell surplus in free markets; railroads, banks, and heavy industry nationalized

compromise with peasants, but brought rapid recovery to industry & economy

power struggle after Lenin's death; Stalin won more support over Trotsky

The Five-Year Plans

goal: industry up 250%, agriculture 150%, frenzy to modernize

Stalin committed to socialism & want to catch up to capitalists

peasants wanted land, thought they would become capitalists

collectivize by creating state-controlled estates from individual peasant farms

better-off peasants (kulaks) stripped of land, starved or in labor camps

slaughter animals & burn crops in protest; not productive & no financial contribution

wanted to destroy Ukrainian nationalism & break peasants' will

purge political elite, high grain quota; great famine (Holodomor)

industry up 4x, many migrated to cities to become industrial workers

funds for factories collected by hidden sales taxes; labor discipline, no trade unions

foreign engineers (Americans) hired to plan factories; modeled on America's

Life and Culture in Soviet Society

reduced consumption, shortages, housing problems

received pensions, medical services & education, day-care, no unemployment

leave egalitarian policies, trained experts needed for industrialization, upper class

Bolshevik Revolution gave women equal rights - Stalin wanted traditional family

women work in farms & factories, became specialists; propaganda & indoctrination culture

Stalinist Terror and the Great Purges

Sergei Kirov killed, launch reign of terror; Old Bolsheviks confess in show trials

arrest & torture party officials & new members, & ordinary citizens

executed or sent to gulags (labor camps) to fuel industrialization

new Communist Party members join seeking opportunities & rewards

Richard Pipes on Communism

revolution needed enemies

Kirov's murder eliminate potential rival & allow campaign to eliminate Lenin's top people

terror & interrogation make wish for death, confess to false crimes

citizens brought before troikas (regional party secretary, procurator, police chief)

sentenced to death, hard labor, or exile, fulfill quotas

many of higher education; more likely to conspire

forced to report subversive activity

nomenklatura class monopolize authority, unique privileges, hereditary

humans travesty of what they could, should, and had to become; could be killed

destroy free speech; close non-Bolshevik press, censorship bureau (Glavlit)

not until 1930s told authors what to write; no travel abroad/foreign publications

Socialist Realism; social ethics decline

deification of Stalin, fear assassins, watch films

Cheka - GPU & OGPU - NKVD - KGB main source of terror

Class Notes

capital now at Moscow

now called the USSR

lost land became Finland

Lenin dies - Trotsky has credit, but Stalin becomes chairman, exile Trotsky

Trotsky has affair in Mexico, assassinated in Mexico 2nd attempt

5 year plans - 250% industry, 150% agriculture

goal to modernize, doesn't care about death, nobody is safe

no progressive ideas, methods are conservative, goals are radical

advancing nation with brutal methods

collectivization - peasants destroy fields and animals for no benefit

Stalin sets conditions for famine

move farmers in country to factories

targets Kulaks, Ukraine wants independence

blockades Ukraine to starve them, biggest country in Europe

soviet propaganda about future, not past; leader omnipotent

race doesn't matter in communism, cult of the leader

too good a job in nomenklatura, gets killed

exile in Siberia, hard, pointless labor

Women had better opportunities under Stalin

Seite 2

Day 2 - The Rising Sun: Japan Before WWII

From Liberalism to Ultranationalism in Japan

most of Japan Japanese; build nationalistic, modern state, resisting imperialism

master technology, victory against Russia and China, took German holdings

economy expands as profits won markets Europe couldn't supply

nationalists want to enlighten and protect Asia; some want peacefully

naval limitation with West, give Shandong to China, reducing tensions

democracy; men > 25 years could vote; 2 party competition, increased living standards & literacy rates

few natural resources, vulnerable to ups and downs of world trade, support colonial empire

colonies for prestige & defense; now needed for resources & economic growth

zaibatsu in economy, dominated sector of unorganized farmers & peasants

financial oligarchy, corrupt government officials, weak middle class

elites (emperor, government officials, businessmen, military leaders), power struggle; ultranationalism

ultranationalism: reject West (democracy, big business, Marxism), destroy old Japan

stress emperor's divinity & samurai code of honor

assassinate moderate leaders & armed uprisings against party politics

foreign expansion, Kita Ikki, believed in "noble mission"

Great Depression: exports & wages down, unemployment up, peasants starve

Japan Against China

young Japanese army officers in Manchuria from peasantry, army budget declined

Chinese nationalism (Guomindang unification) challenge Japanese control, use aggression

Japan made Manchuria an independent state, use Puyi (Qing) as puppet emperor

resign from League of Nation to protest disapproval of aggression, army independent

try to create economic bloc for industry in East Asia; news glorify empire

for China, distract from modernization, boycott social reform, land reform & poverty

unequal landownership, many own 1/6 land, starved & in debt

nationalists with Jiang Jieshi try to destroy Communists, who retreated in Long March

Mao Zedong rebuilt forces & won peasant support - (no pillage/rape, schools, health clinics, help peasants with agriculture, tried warlords & landlords

Japan military & ultranationalists in control, general attack

took Beijing & Shanghai, "Rape of Nanjing", in stalemate

called the Second Sino-Japanese War - conflicting nationalism

Class Notes

Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere

White Man's Burden

need food and resources, seize Manchuria, fuel industry

WWII starts in 1937 in Asia

Seite 3

Day 3 - Hitler and Nazism in Germany

Hitler and Nazism in Germany

The Roots of Nazism

Nazism grew from extreme nationalism & racism, led by Adolf Hitler

son of Austrian customs officer, join extreme Austro-German nationalists

found racism, anti-Semitism & hate Slavs - Social Darwinism, racial conflict inevitable

Jews direct finance capitalism, Marxist socialism, against German unity/race

WWI gain meaning - blamed Jews & Marxists for surrender

joined German Workers' Party - socialism would abolish capitalism - Nazi Party

Weimar Republic hyperinflation, von Hindenburg became president, Hitler's unsuccessful coup

Hitler's Road to Power

denounce Weimar Republic, need legal power; Mein Kampf - anti-semitic, expansion, Fuhrer dictator

built Nazis during stability, promise salvation during Depression, gain success

reject free-market capitalism, advocate recovery - middle & lower classes & skilled workers

many desert conservative & moderate for Nazis - become largest party

appeal to German youth, national recovery, exciting change, & personal advancement appeal

Depression made republican leaders look corrupt, Communists didn't unite with Social Democrats

gain business & army support, thinking he would help them; von Hindenburg appoint chancellor

The Nazi State and Society

blamed Communists for Reichstag building fire, made president abolish liberties & new elections

Nazis lost election, outlaw Communists & arrest, sign Enabling Act, giving Hitler 4 years dictatorship

Nazis top in government, outlaw strikes & unions, independent organizations to Nazis, publishers & schools controlled by Nazis, no modern art/architecture; dynamism & total obedience

SS (elite personal guard) kill Nazi storm troopers, army surrender, Himmler & SS take over police

Jews banned from work, Nuremberg laws take citizenship, many emigrate

Kristallnacht - destruction of Jewish buildings, difficult for Jews to leave after

Hitler's Popularity

public works, rearmament, standard of living up, employment up, profits up

except Jews, Slavs, Gypsies, Jehovah's Witnesses, communists, and gays, more equality & opportunity

relaxed educational requirements, tolerate privilege and wealth

well-educated retain advantages (social leveling), hire women during labor shortages

Communists & socialists, Catholics & Protestants, & army officers oppose

Class Notes

Beer Hall Putsch (1923)

Reichstag Fire (Feb 1933) - dictators need a crisis - blame the communists

Enabling Act passed - dictatorial power

Night of Long Knives - first purge

liked WWI - Austrian, good soldier

returns to Vienna, meets Austro-German nationalists - monarchy & aristocracy in capital, Slavs, Jews, Communists, and capitalists - hate everyone but the nationalists

goes to Germany, try to seize power at Beer Hall Putsch

Nazis had 12 seats at Reichstag 1930

1932 - 39% of seats/vote, biggest party, not majority

named Chancellor

Hitler uses the system legally

purge the SA - Nazi army (Brownshirts, 400,000) biggest army

top thousand brownshirts purged by brownshirts (can't invade, only thugs)

race & living space (Empire)

allows to get the Reichswahr, better trained army, on his side

economic depression, government cannot stop dictator

Hitler's Nazi Party - militaristic

Seite 4

Day 4 - Hitler and Nazism in Germany, Round 2

Aggression and Appeasement, 1933 - 1939

Treaty of Versailles limit German army to 100,000 - withdraw from League of Nations

military draft, France, Britain, & Italy protest his actions

Britain appease to avoid war - underestimate Hitler, worried about Soviet Communism

Churchill disliked appeasement, but not prepared in France or Britain for war

Hitler invaded Rhineland; Britain refused intervention, France couldn't act without

Mussolini attacked Ethiopia, Italy join Germany in Rome-Berlin Axis

Japan join for support in Manchuria

Germany & Italy help Fascist Franco in Spanish Civil War

Republican Spain only helped by Soviet Union

Hitler threaten Austrian chancellor, Austria became part of Germany

target Sudetenland, Czechoslovakia try defense, Chamberlain ceded to them

no self-determination, use Czechs and Slovaks as captives

refer to Slavs as Untermenschen (inferior), sign non-aggression pact

Stalin distrust West, need time for industry & military, was offered territory

Germans attack Poland, Britain & France declare war on Germany

capitalism - liberal, democratic

socialism - control large industries

communism - government complete control

fascism - 1 leader, worship dictator (Nazi)

Democratic

- free speech

- private ownership

- upper class appeal

Communist

- guarantee jobs

- run by workers

- lower class appeal

Fascist

- union benefits

- effects of Treaty & Depression

- nationalism

- mixed class appeal

Class Notes

annex Austria, Britain and France allow Germany, self-determination

wants land

with Stalin, promise to divide Eastern Europe

Blitzkreig - 1939 Poland, Oct 1939 - Mar 1940 - Phony War

Maginot Line - fortifications at border, Germans went through less fortified Belgium - useless

Hitler invades France; falls in 6 weeks

Luftwaffe - German air force to take Britain, no land invasions

Operation Barbarossa - take Soviet Union, largest invasion 1800 mi, 3 million men - huge gains

Seite 5

Day 5 - Japan: Empire in the Pacific

Japan's Asian Empire

crush peasant Nationalists & Communists - Rape of Nanjing, Sino-Japanese War

ultranationalists call liberation mission, worship semidivine emperor

join Axis alliance, Vichy gave French Indochina to block aid for China

U.S. supply 90% of oil, few reserves; embargo to Japan, declare war

Pearl Harbor - sank American battleships (aircraft carriers at sea), destroy air force in Philippines

Hitler declare war, Japan seize islands, Philippines

support for Japan decline through war; no equal, no governments, cut wages, drafts

kill wounded and POWs, rape nurses, Korean comfort women

Seite 6

Day 6 - The War in Europe and Asia

The Second World War, 1939 - 1945

Britain, US, & Soviet Union form Grand Alliance

Hitler's Empire in Europe, 1939 - 1945

Hitler's Blitzkrieg (lightning war) take Poland quickly

Soviet Union took east Poland, Lithuania, Estonia, & Latvia

Germans attack France through Belgium; Petain form Vichy, surrender

French support Petain, but then he collaborated with the Nazis

Battle of Britain - bomb with airforce before invading on land

broke Soviet pact - take Leningrad/Moscow, winter stopped invasion

racial imperialism dictate New Order: Dutch/Norway/Swede/Dane, French, Jews/Slavs

hoped Poles, Ukrainians & Russians would die, more room for Germans

The Holocaust

force Jews into ghettos, German sent to Poland - arrest, camps, murder

Catholics & Protestants rarely protest, most Germans sympathetic to Nazis

The Grand Alliance

Churchill's Europe First Policy - Hitler, then Japan, no treaties/division; best military

The War in Europe, 1942 - 1945

Hitler defeated at Stalingrad, pushed back; Germany enlist women & slaves

Allies attack through North Africa, British defeat at Battle of El Alamein

Italians depose Mussolini, surrender; Germans save Mussolini for puppet government

Germans surrender in Italy; Mussolini executed soon after

Eisenhower (American & British) at Normandy, France, invade Germany; Soviets met at Elbe River

The War in the Pacific, 1942 - 1945

America defend Port Moseby in Battle of the Coral Sea, won Battle of Midway for naval equality

island hopping with Australia; bombing & hand to hand combat

kill Japanese after Battle of Guadalcanal mercilessly

MacArthur at Battle of Leyte Gulf, Japanese navy down

Iwo Jima & Okinawa, bloodiest battles; destroyed by bombings

Stalin gave Japan hope of diplomacy; plan to seize territories

Potsdam Declaration demand surrender, unclear of emperor's safety

atomic bombs, Soviet invade Manchukuo, avoid both by surrendering

Nazism

1. Fascism

- authoritarian rule

- ultranationalism

- empire

2. race & living space

- Austria and Sudetenland } German nationalism

- Czechoslovakia and Poland } no German nationals

3. militarism

4. emphasizes continuity with past

5. hate communism

Japan agrees with all but 4 and 5

Luftwaffe - small German planes

Hitler doesn't dedicate industry as fully to war production

will can overcome - nationalism

doesn't need to suffer; wants consumer goods at home

Operation Barbarossa - invade Russia

Soviet Union would have defeated Germany without D-day

Eastern Theater was the most important

Stalin has the industrial capacity to make a comeback and the will to slaughter Russians

the difference between WWI and WWII is great leadership

Seite 7

Day 7 - The Start of the Cold War

Goals of Hiroshima and Nagasaki:

force the surrender of Japan

establish America's supremacy in the world

boost America's authority in postwar dealings with Soviet Union

shock factor - psychologically force them to stop fighting

beat Soviet Union to it, because they could have taken Japan themselves

5/8/45 - VE Day

8/6/45 - Hiroshima

8/8/45 - OSSR (Manchuria) invasions

8/9/45 - Nagasaki

8/15/45 - VJ Day

8/8 - military generals in Japan voted on whether they should surrender; split vote

Czechoslovakia ruled by:

1914 - Austria Hugary

1919 - 1929 - independent

1940 - Germany

1950 - USSR

Poland ruled by:

1914 - Germany/Russia

1919 - 1929 - independent

1940 - Nazi Germany/Russia

1950 - USSR

Iron Curtain: border of Russian territory post-war

FDR - Federal Democratic Republic

GDR - German Democratic Republic

GDR is communist East Germany

11% of East German population flees through West Berlin

Berlin Wall built around West Berlin, on East German soil

closes off the escape route

3 fences, serious about not letting them leave

Seite 8

Day 8 - Cold War and the Berlin Wall

Berlin Wall

East German economy suffered as people left

collectivization

industry, sacrifice consumer goods for weaponry

thought control