I Speak of Freedom, 1961 Part 3.

Type of document Essay

2 Pages Double Spaced

Subject area History

Academic Level Undergraduate

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Please answer all three essay questions for this assignment. Thank you. Two full pages please.

In many ways Japanese militarization leading up to World War II coincided with the power vacuum in China. Describe the events in China & Japan leading up to World War II
Describe the events in Europe leading to the rise of Hitler and the beginning of World War II. In your opinion (based on those events) could World War II have been avoided? If so, how and when? If not, why do you think it was unavoidable?
Describe the problems in Palestine/Israel after World War I to the 1970s. Is there a peaceful solution? Is so, what solution to you believe would solve the problems? If not, why not?

Feedback from my professor from a previous essay questions

Part 3 — you needed to be much more detailed (discuss specific examples from specific colonies,

Brief Timeline of Events

1920-1921 – Italy faced multiple large-scale strikes by workers. Italian workers felt cheated by World War I because they had been promised social and land reforms in exchange for fighting.
1922 – Benito Mussolini assumed control of Italy. He offered to end the strikes by putting more men to work. Part of his plan involved removing women from the workforce to free up those jobs for men. Mussolini’s policies for women encouraged women to have many children.
1923-4 the Ruhr Crisis – this is a crisis between French and German relations as Belgians march into the Ruhr valley and occupy it.
1923- Benito Mussolini formed his own para-military, known as the Black Shirts.
1925 Locarno – the Western European powers met at Locarno to create some peace agreements. First, the Germans promise to forever honor the boundaries on the West, but they do not extend this promise to their eastern boundaries (Poland, Czechoslovakia, Austria). Second, the English promise to protect France and Belgium against any aggression, but they refused to make the same promise to countries Eastern Europe. Third, the French extended specific guarantees to Poland and Czechoslovakia saying that if either of those countries was attacked, France would march to their aid.
1925 – In Mein Kampf, Hitler presents his basic anti-Semitic ideas and his conviction that Germany needed more land for expansion
1926 – Germany was allowed to join the League of Nations.
1928 – the Kellogg-Briand Pact – This outlawed war. The countries take an oath to use some means besides war to settle differences and 65 countries signed it.
1929 – The Lateran Agreement gave Mussolini the support of the pope and the Catholic Church.
1929 – the Great Depression – stock markets collapsed, unemployment increased. This put democracy to the test. Many people became communists as they felt that capitalism had failed. They believe that the communist countries were surviving the depression better than the capitalist countries. In the 1930’s the Soviet Union was ending its unemployment problems – but what they did not realized was that it did so by killing million of its own people in the 1930s Purges and used forced labor to rapidly industrialize. In 1929-32 Germany suffered tremendously in the Great Depression which led to the growth of Fascism and the collapse of the Weimar Republic. By 1932, one out of every three working Germans was out of work (the US at its worst is 1 out of every 4). In 1928 the Nazi Party (National Sozialisten Deutche Partie) had 800,000 votes in national elections, but 1930 it has 7 million votes, and by 1932 it has 14 million votes.
1931 – Japan invaded Manchuria because it wanted the region’s raw materials
1931 – Civil war broke out in Spain and the Spanish overthrow the Bourbon kings.
January 30, 1933 – Adolph Hitler became Chancellor of Germany. By the end of the year he was in complete control of the German government, and he took Germany out of the League of Nations.
1933 – Hitler acquired absolute dictatorial powers with the passage of the Enabling Act.
1934 – the Nazis staged an unsuccessful attempt to take over Austria (Austria will last another 4 years). Mussolini (Italy) objected to Germany taking over Austria as he was afraid Germany would become too strong, and he still wanted part of Austria’s land for Italy.
1934 – Russia joined the League of Nations. Russian leaders read Hitler’s book Mein Kampf and realized that, if Hitler planned to meet the goals outlined in his book, Russia needed some allies. However, most of the European countries felt that Stalin was a greater threat than Hitler.
1935 – Russia signed a peace treaty with France and Czechoslovakia, but Russia and France never really trusted each other. Russia promised the Czechs that Russia will come to its defense against Germany, but only after France honored this agreement and entered the war first.
1935 – Italy under the command of Mussolini invaded Ethiopia. When Ethiopian leader Haile Selassie requested the aid of the League of Nations, the western powers ignored his plea.
1935 – The passage of the Nuremberg Laws in Germany. The Nuremberg Laws stated anyone having three or more Jewish grandparents was Jewish
1935 – Germans in the Saar valley vote that the Saar would become part of Germany once again. That same year, Hitler announced Germany would re-arm and he implemented a draft violating the terms of the Treaty of Versailles, but none of the Western countries do anything to stop him.
1936 – Hitler sent troops into the Rhineland (another violation of the Treaty of Versailles)
1936 – Francisco Franco (a fascist rebel) launched an attack on the government of Spain. He was supported by Italy (sent tanks) and by Germany (sent the German Luftwaffe – air force). No one supported the republican government of Spain; the French and English instituted trade embargoes for both sides.
October 1936 – the Rome-Berlin Axis – This was an alliance between fascist Italy and Nazi Germany.
1937 – Japan launches a full-scale invasion of China
November 1937 – Anti-Comintern Pact – This alliance between Italy, Japan and Berlin formed the Axis Powers of the Second World War.
1938 – German invasion of the Sudetenland
1938 – (September). The Munich Agreement or Appeasement officially gave Hitler the Sudetenland. The Czechoslovakian government was not invited to the conference. The British were willing to appease Hitler because they thought Soviet Communists were a bigger threat to Europe’s stability.
1939 – (March) – Germany invades Czechoslovakia
1939 – (August) – Germany signed a ten-year nonaggression pact with the Soviet Union.
1939 – (September) – Germany invaded Poland.
1940 – Germany invaded France. The German attack on France relied on blitzkrieg, which means “lightening war.” This strategy involved sending airforce to knock out communication then sending tanks into major towns.

Sterilization, Genocide and Holocaust

Sterilization, Genocide and Holocaust are policies used to get rid of groups within the society. The first policy which Hitler used was Sterilization of the Handicapped. Mentally and physically handicapped people were sterilized so that they could not have children usually by radiation treatments. Hitler got this idea from America, Switzerland and the Scandinavian in which doctors would perform these procedures, although sterilization was not an official government program. Hitler then began a campaign of euthanasia (killing off the elderly and handicapped) but there was so much public outrage at this program that he gave it up for a while

Genocide is the effort to destroy a national, ethnic or racial group. The first German campaign for genocide was in Southwestern Africa (Namibia) in 1904 to 1907 when Germany decided to get rid of one of the native groups there (German soldiers rounded up about 1,000 Herero and killed them). In 1905 to 1907, Germany used genocide in Tanzania. It had ordered the farmers in Tanzania to grow cotton instead of food, when they refused the German government sent troops over and killed approximately 120,000 people. However, Germany is not the only country to use genocide. Stalin killed 8 million non-Russian people living in the Soviet Union when he came to power.

The Holocaust is the systematic, bureaucratic annihilation of about 6-9 million Jews. In 1933 there were approximately 9-12 million Jews throughout all of Europe (Germany only had 500,000 Jews – 1% of the German population). By 1945, 2/3 of the Jewish population in Europe had been killed (most in death camps). Death camps also killed gypsies, mentally and physically handicapped people, Poles, Russians, Prisoners of war, homosexuals, communists/socialists, Jehovah’s Witnesses… The first concentration camp was built in 1933. In 1933, Hitler enacted laws removed all Jews from the government, universities, and legal positions. Four months later he called for the boycott of Jewish businesses. Then he enacted the Nuremburg Laws which stripped anyone of Jewish ancestry of German citizenship, banned them from schools, theaters, resorts and even walking on the sidewalks in certain areas of towns. Hitler’s “Final Solution” was to first concentrate the Jews in ghettos. By 1938, Hitler’s domestic policies had resulted in the virtual elimination of unemployment because it removed so many people from the work force. From those ghettos Jewish Germans would be moved into work camps where thousands would die from overcrowding and starvation. In 1942-4, Hitler will slowly remove the ghettos. At the Wannsee conference of 1942, Hitler made his final decision to kill the Jews. Work camps and death camps would be located in rural areas near railroads. He needed the railroads to move the people quickly to the death camps, but he knew that the German people would begin to protest if they saw the death camps (it also made it more difficult for prisoners to escape).

When Germany invaded Poland on December 1, 1939, it completely defeated the Polish army in one month and set up its own government over the conquered Polish people. Germany then began a campaign to enslave the Poles. The leaders of Polish society (government officials, priests, professors, writers, artists) were killed or forced to publicly support Hitler’s control. Hitler had gained the support of the German people for this military takeover of Poland by giving speeches in which he stated that Germany needed to create “Lebensraum” (living space) for the Germans. His plan was to remove the Polish people, so that Germans can move into Poland. Using the prejudice of the Germans against the Slavic people, he had campaigned for the enslavement and forced relocation of the Slavic people in Poland. His eventual plan was, once he had taken over Russia, to force all the Slavic people (from Poland and Czechoslovakia) to work as slaves in the mining and farming industries in Russia. Naturally, he kept quiet about this while he was still on good terms with Stalin. While the Czech people were almost completely Slavic, the Polish had some Germanic background. Hitler ordered German officers to kidnap Polish children who look Germanic (meaning blond-haired and blue-eyed) in hopes of turning them into good Germans. Sadly for these children, he later decided that their blood was too tainted by Slavic blood so that they were incapable of becoming German and sent them to the death camps.

World War II and Beyond

March 1938 Germany began its expansion with the “Anschluss.” This was the forced unification of Austria into Germany. Many Austrian officials wanted this annexation because Austria was still bankrupt from the end of World War I. They saw that Hitler had turned the German economy around, and hoped that he would do the same for Austria. However, there were many Austrians who opposed the annexation because they did not want to give up their national identity or because they opposed Hitler’s fascist government. Many opponents were imprisoned and executed. Some escaped Austria – the most famous of these was the Van Trapp family from The Sound of Music (many of the details of the musical are accurate: Colonel Van Trapp was a famous Austrian military commander from World War I, he did have seven children from his first marriage, he did marry his children’s governess who had lived in a nunnery, he did refuse to serve in the army after the annexation, his family did escape by walking across the Alps…). Austria was formally annexed to Germany against the terms of the Treaty of Versailles after World War I, and yet the Western powers do nothing to stop this.

In September of 1938, Hitler gave a moving speech about the poor Germans who were living in the Sudetenland, an area that had formerly been part of Germany but had been removed from Germany and added to the newly formed Czechoslovakia by the Treaty of Versailles after World War I. Hitler ended his speech by calling for the Sudetenland to be re-annexed to Germany. However, the Sudetenland was Czechoslovakia=s main defense; it was a barrier between the rest of Czechoslovakia and Germany. The annexation of the Sudetenland would leave Czechoslovakia was the only democratic republic left in Eastern Europe. The Czechs mobilized their army to defend themselves from a Germany attack. Then Mussolini diffused some of the tensions by calling for a Four Power Conference in Munich which included Italy and Germany on one side with England and France on the other (they did not invite Russia or Czechoslovakia). England and France agree to a plan of Appeasement (peace at any price). England manipulated France into an agreement to ignore its guarantee to protect Czechoslovakia. Since Russia’s promise to defend Czechoslovakia depended on France helping them first, this also nullified the Russian agreement. At the time there was a known plot in Germany against Hitler. If the Western powers had been willing to stand up against Hitler, then the German military would have thrown Hitler out of power.

With the support of Germany and Italy, in 1939 Francisco Franco became dictator of Spain (this will last until the 1970’s). That same year, in March 1939 Hitler moved into the rest of Czechoslovakia, and began to demand part of Poland. In April 1939 Italy invaded Albania. It was slowly dawning on the Western powers that Hitler was preparing the way for an invasion. He had annexed or allied with several powers decreasing the number of countries which could try to stop him. From March to April of 1939, England wrote guarantees promising to protect Poland, Romania, Greece, and Turkey (especially Poland). In August 1939 Germany and Russia agreed to a Non-Aggression Pact in which they promised not to fight each other and to divide Poland and Finland up between the two of them as a sign of their willingness to work together. By doing this, Hitler ensured that he would not have to fight a two-front war. On December 1, 1939 Germany invaded Poland. Poland had a large army, but Hitler used “blitzkrieg” (lightening war). First. he sent in the German Luftwaffe (air force) to destroy the communications system. Next, he sent in tanks to take over the capital. The Germans wanted to defeat Poland, before Russia had a chance to enter the war, because they were afraid Russia would take all of Poland. Russian troops do not arrive in Poland until Dec. 17, by which time Germany has virtually wiped out the Polish army. England and France declared war on Germany, but decided not to send troops to Poland since its government had already collapsed. France chose to build a huge wall of steel and fortresses so strong on its border with Germany so that it would be able to keep the Germans out (this is called the Maginot Line), but the Germans simply went around it and attacked France through Belgium as they had done in World War I. This period of the war is called the Phoney War because the English and French were not really fighting even though they had declared war on Germany. In the meantime, Stalin tried to meet with the English and French governments, but they refused to discuss an alliance with him. Germany received word of Stalin’s efforts and Hitler chose to renew his peace settlement with the Soviet Union by granting it part of Poland. With no hope of an alliance with the Western powers, Stalin felt that his best chance of escaping a war was to accept Hitler’s offer. This kept peace in the east allowing Hitler to focus his attention elsewhere. German soldiers moved on to conquer Norway, and Denmark, then Belgium, Luxemburg (which fell in 1 day) and the Netherlands (which fell in 5 days). The English and French were finally forced to send troops to defend Belgium because they had promised to defend Belgium against any outside force, but their soldiers were trapped at the battle of Dunkirk, only escaping Dunkirk in fishing boats and leaving their weapons behind.

On January 5, 1940 German soldiers went around the Maginot Line forcing the French government to surrender. Hitler was convinced that the British would simply surrender – but they did not. This is also a perfect time to mention the limitations of Hitler’s successes. While he was able to officially “conquer” countries, the nature of his military tactics have left many questions for historians. Our best understanding of his efforts is that he established temporary, collaborating (locals who were willing to work for him) governments which he intended to replace as soon as he had finished his conquest. If Hitler had lived longer, it is doubtful that he would have been able to maintain his empire as he had envisioned it. While countries like France were nominally conquered, they had strong resistance movements and once faced with the reality of German officials running the government, would have fought even harder to overthrow the government Hitler had established (in France it was known as the Vichy government). Many “collaborators” only worked for the Germans in hopes of undermining their authority. After World War II was over, many collaborators were tried and sentenced to execution or life in prison in the Nuremburg Trials.

In June 1940 Hitler turned against his old ally, Russia. Hitler’s reasons for doing this are not clear, although in part it was an effort to take over the rich oil fields in Russia. Also, Hitler’s racist policies called for the Slavic people to be used as slave labor on lands that were currently part of Russia. Russia (the Soviet Union) was not ready for a German attack. In his rise to power, Stalin had executed virtually all of the Russian generals leaving him with few military commanders who had actually seen battlefield experience. However, Stalin realized the German soldiers would have to rely on food and supplies they could scavenge from the countryside, so Stalin destroyed everything in the path of the German soldiers (burning crops so the Germans could not take the food and destroyed the railroads so the Germans could not use them). The German army slaughtered hundreds of thousands of Russian soldiers. The leader of the German army wanted to immediately attack Stalingrad (formerly Moscow), but Hitler overruled him (hoping Stalingrad would surrender on its own). This gave Stalin the time he needed to gather more soldiers. In the Battle of Stalingrad, heavy rains immobilized the German tanks, leaving them as sitting targets for Russian attack. Hitler had delayed his attack on Russia in order to send soldiers to help the Italians out in their campaign against Greece (Mussolini had attacked Greece, but the Italian army was almost wiped out by the Greeks before Hitler could send German soldiers in to help them). This delay meant that German soldiers were in Russia during the winter – it was the coldest winter in the 20th century with temperature at -40° F (cold enough that the oil in the German tanks froze leaving the tanks useless). These events had two positive side effects for the Allies. First, it became clear that Hitler was against Stalin making it easier for Stalin to ally the Soviet Union with France (the French resistance movement) and England. Neither the French resistance leaders nor the English government were enthusiastic about this alliance, but they needed all the help that they could get. Second, the Soviet Union had proven that Hitler’s forces could be defeated. Until this point, many of the resistance leaders had problems overcoming the local mindset that German was invincible. While people wanted to reclaim their independence, they secretly believed that it would not actually happen. Once they heard about the victory at Stalingrad, more people joined the resistance movements and there were new efforts to coordinated combined attacks against the Germans.

In August 1940 the “Battle of Britain” began. This was the name for Hitler’s air war over England. There were only two ways that a country could an island: navy or airforce. A naval invasion limited the attack to coastal targets until soldiers were able to invade. Air strike opened up many more areas for attack while limiting the amount of potential death on the attacking side. The British Royal Airforce lost 915 airplanes, but the Luftwaffe lost 1,730 airplanes and Hitler decided to end the air war. England was able to defeat the Germans by inventing radars (so that they could see the German planes coming in) and deciphering the German secret code (Operation Ultra, Polish spies stole one of the machines used to write the German secret code and take the machine to England; the English will then break the code, and the Germans never found out about it). In America, the President (FDR) announced that the US would remain neutral, but that it would provide weapons for the English. In order to get around the Neutrality Acts which stated that America would not sell weapons to a nation at war, FDR instituted the Lend-Lease Program (the Americans will lend about $50 billion worth of tanks and weapons to the allies).

What about the rest of the European countries? Many of the “Neutral” Countries in Europe were not as neutral as they pretended to be. In Switzerland banks absorbed Jewish bank accounts and transferred the money to Germany and financed German military purchases. In Sweden the government allowed Germany to use its railroad system and it used its own navy to protect German supply ships sailing in its waters. Spain sent 40,000 volunteers to help the German army.

The Pacific Side of the War

In 1928 there was an unauthorized assassination of Zuolin by members of Japanese military followed by an unauthorized destruction of railroad through Manchuria in 1931. The Japanese military made it look like Chinese destroyed the railroad to excuse police action against China. By 1932 the Japanese army controlled Manchuria although officially it was still known as the state of “Manchukuo” led by Qing emperor. In 1936 son of Zhang Zuolin kidnapped Jiang Jieshi (Chinese Nationalist) for no standing against Japan – forced him to agree to work with Communist. The League of Nations responded by condemning Japan’s actions to which Japan responded by leaving the League of Nations. An aborted military coup in1936 (February 26 Incident) led to military-dominated council. Later that same year Japan allied with Germany in the Anti-Comintern Pact (Italy joined 1937).

On July 7, 1937 Japan launched a full-scale invasion of China and by December it had conquered Beijing, Tianjin and Shanghai. The Chinese countered by blocking Japan at Nanjing/Nanking but was badly defeated in what became known as the “Rape of Nanking.” One of the reasons why the more populated China fell so quickly to Japan was internal political problems in China. China’s government was split between Nationalists and Communists. They spent most of their time fighting each other instead of the invading Japanese army. In 1942 Nationalist Jiang Jieshi blockaded Chinese Communists.

In June 1937 Prince Konoe Fumimaro became Prime Minister of Japan. He called for a program of removing the Western Influences. He promoted this in 1941 as the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere bringing other Asian countries (willingly or unwillingly) into this union. In spite of its name, Japan dominated the economics of this group providing raw materials and munitions. The Japanese government called for national mobilization: rationing energy and food. They even asked people to reject “decadence” (consumer culture). They banned unions, women’s groups and other political parties.

Korea had become a full colony of Japan in 1910. The period from 1919 to1930 is known as “cultural rule” meaning that Japan allowed Korea to have its own political movements. In the late 1937s as part of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, Japan forced Korea to send over most of its rice. In 1938 millions of Korean men forced to work in factories and mines, and between 100,000 and 200,000 women were forced to become prostitutes for Japanese military. In 1940 Japan ordered Koreans to adopt Japanese surnames. That same year, Japan moved into French Indo-China (Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia) in search of more raw materials. Since Japan did not have large sources of raw material, it had relied on the US for oil and metals. The US responded with an embargo on iron and steel in 1940 followed by an embargo on oil in summer 1941. Japan’s reaction was to invade the oil-rich Dutch East Indies while pretending to give consideration to these demands. The Japanese government informed the U.S. government that it would be given Japan’s final decision on December 7, 1941. The US believed that Japan was preparing an airstrike against the American airforce bases in the Philippines. Because of that, the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor did not harm American aircraft carriers. On December 7, 1941 the US was surprised by the attack at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The designer of the Japanese plan to attack Pearl Harbor actually did not want Japan to go to war against the America, because he knew that the US had a lot more people and a lot more resources than Japan. He designed the plan so Japan could have the advantage of surprise hoping that it would be able to win a quick victory. However, the Japanese did not realize that most of the US Pacific fleet was out of Pearl Harbor (actually training for the up coming war). The US was so angry at this attack that it began to drop fire-bombs on Japanese cities – 7 million Japanese (mostly civilians) were killed by fire-bombs because Japanese towns were made out of wood. In the meantime, Japan continued its conquests taking Guam, Hong Kong, Singapore and Java. In America, Japan’s actions led the American government to intern all westcoast Japanese Americans as potential spies. Executive Order 9066 established Internment camps for Japanese Americans and gave them one weekend to sell anything they could not carry and move into the camps.

On December 14, 1941 Germany declared war on the United States. If Germany had not declared war on the US it is possible that the US would not have become involved in the European side of the war. The Soviets and French wanted the US to immediately attack Germany through France (France hoped this would help the French Resistance drive the Germans out of France; Russia hoped this would force Germany to fight on two fronts so that Germany would withdraw some of its troops from Russia to send them to fight in France). However, England and the US decided to attack German soldiers in North Africa and then through Italy into Europe. Russia believed that the US chose this plan specifically because it would take longer and that the US was secretly hoping that Germany would defeat Communist Russia before US soldiers would arrive (this was one reason for the Cold War between Russians and the US).

In 1942 American General Douglas MacArthur stopped the Japanese expansion towards Australia in the Battle of Coral Sea. He then blocked the Japanese from expansion towards Hawaii with the Battle of Midway Island. On the western front, on November 8, 1942, General Dwight Eisenhower landed US soldiers in Africa and moved into Morocco and Algeria. By May 13, 1943 his forces had captured 275,000 German soldiers stationed in North Africa. America was finally ready to invade Europe. On July 10, 1943 the US military began its attack on Sicily then moved on to Italy. Italy fell to American forces quickly, but before a peace treaty was finalized, the king of Italy returned and demanded his kingdom back (the king of Italy had been living in exile since 1922). While America debated what it should do, Italy regrouped with the help of German soldiers and continued the war. Rome fell to the U.S. a second time on June 4, 1944 finally defeated.

During the intervening years, the leaders of the four major allies (England, the French resistance government, the U.S. and the Soviet Union) met for several conferences. At the Moscow Conference in October of 1943 the allies promised to continue fighting until Germany gave an unconditional surrender (not an armistice/cease fire as had happened in World War I). They also agreed that they would form a new organization of all countries (United Nations) at the end of the war. Later that same year, they met at the Tehran Conference in which the U.S. promised to start a second war front in France in Summer 1944. In response, Stalin agreed to join war against Japan (something that the U.S. supported in 1943, but changed its mind by 1945 when Stalin made it clear he wanted to claim part of the Japanese islands). At the Teheran Conference the Allies also declared their interest in recreating Poland. Stalin wanted an additional promise to permanently divide Germany but England and the US made no promises.

On June 6, 1944 (D-Day) American and English forces finally launched the Normandy invasion known as “Operation Overlord.” They purposefully chose to land at a location that was not the closes distance between England and France knowing that German forces were waiting for them. Even with the initial element of surprise, the D-Day invasion was a blood-bath. There were 5,000 Allied losses on 1st day. Landing on a beach is one of the most difficult military maneuvers before modern military equipment (and it is still very difficult). The boats are easily visible from the shore lines, while people on shore can hide behind rocks, trees or cliffs. The soldiers must get off the boats, usually with one hand on the side of the boat while the other is holding their guns up above the water. Their fellow soldiers are on the boats behind them, unable to fire at the enemy on the shore without hitting the first landing parties caught in between. Once the soldiers were able to land, they were slowly able to push the German forces back and on August 15, 1944 American and French forces took Paris. In the meantime the Soviet Union has been angered by the delays. They felt that the U.S., England and France were taking too long (Russia was already at the German border, while the others are still only halfway through France. The situation did not improve very quickly. By the Yalta Conference (Feb. 1945), Russia was 100 miles from Berlin, but the Western forces still had not entered Germany. To appease Stalin, the Western powers made concessions to the Soviet Union in Asia. In exchange, the Soviet Union agreed to declare war on Japan once Germany was defeated. Three months later, May 8, 1945 (V-Day) Germany surrendered and the European side of the war ended. At the Potsdam Conference (July 1945), the new American President Harry Truman faced off against Stalin. The Soviet Union lost 17 million people in World War II so Stalin felt that the other allies owed the Soviet Union. First, he demanded that the USSR’s border be moved westward into what was Poland (Poland was compensated by shifting its border 100 miles into Germany). More importantly, the Soviet Union was determined that Germany would not have the ability to start World War III. Stalin demanded that Germany would be divided into occupation zones (England, France and the U.S. agree to this but saw the division as temporary). He also rejected the idea of free elections in Eastern Europe because he felt that they would bring in anti-Soviet governments. The delegates also established a Council of Foreign Ministers to draft peace treaties for Germany’s allies (Italy, Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria & Finland).

However, World War II was not completely finished. The war in the Pacific continued for four more months after Germany surrendered. When Germany agreed to a peace settlement, Stalin turned to the U.S. and issued an ultimatum – the U.S. had three months to finish the war against Japan (until August 8, 1945) or the Soviet Union would get involved. If the Soviet Union did come into the war, they had no intention of leaving Japan (the Soviet Union was still searching for a warm-water port – a port far enough to the south that it would not freeze over in the winter). President Truman turned to his advisors and asked them for options. They told him he had three alternatives: First, the U.S. could continue or increase the fire-bombs. They estimated that over 1 million Japanese would die before its government would surrender, and the increase in the number of U.S. airplanes would mean about a 50,000 death toll for American pilots). The second alternative was to conduct a D-Day style invasion of the Japanese islands, but instead of just landing on one coast, they would have to land on multiple coastlines. The advisors estimated that it would take over a million Japanese deaths before the government surrendered and the death toll to American soldiers would be close to half a million. The third option was to drop the newest weapon in America’s arsenal: the atomic bomb. The advisors told Truman that it would cost less Japanese lives (estimated about 100,000 total) and American lives (only the potential of one plane going down). They believed that the bomb would scare the Japanese government into surrendering quickly. Truman delayed the use of the bomb as long as he could, hoping that Japan would surrender without it, but on August 6, 1945 (two days before the Soviet deadline) the U.S. dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima. The estimates of the death toll had been based on destroying a tiny bomb in the desert; those estimates were wrong. The bomb killed almost 100,000 people outright and almost the same amount overtime as the toxic poison slowly destroyed their bodies. The U.S. was also in for another surprise; the Japanese government did not immediately surrender. Japan assumed that the U.S. only had one bomb, so it quarantined the area telling people that the U.S. had dropped some form of biological weapon and waited. On August 8, 1945, as the Soviet Union invaded the northern islands of Japan, the U.S. dropped the second atomic bomb on Nagasaki. It had a similar death toll. Fearing that the U.S. had more bombs, Emperor Hirohito agreed to peace on September 2, 1945. Article 9 of Japan’s postwar constitution abolished its armed forces.