Decade by Decade with SFI

1600-1650
Change over time: With the discovery of America, Europeans seized the opportunity to improve their societies in the New World by employing self-government and individualism.
1. James Colony founded in 1607
2. Separatists depart from Holland and sign the Mayflower Compact
3. First House of Burgesses
4. Puritans and the Cambridge Agreement
5. An Ordinance and Constitution of the Virginia Company sets a precedent of self-government

The Europeans were successful in colonization because they chose to use self-government and individuals to improve upon the things that dissatisfied them in Europe.

1650-1700
Change: America experienced continued tension with Native Americans erupting into conflicts and the start of the French and Indian war over land disputes; religion, dominantly puritanism, influenced governments structure in the colonies in a theocratic style in the lead up to the Great Awakening.
1. Bacon's Rebellion
2. King Phillip's war
3. Puritanism
4. Salem Witch Trials
5. Slavery

Slavery was introduced to the colonies in the triangular trade and slaves were seen as the lowest people in society. The institution of slavery, however, did nit immediately take root in America at the time due to indentured servitude and didn't see a dramatic rise until the turn of the 18th century.

1700-1750
Change: Throughout these years North America shifted from a period of early colonial disputes between Spain, Britain, and France to a time of increased education for the colonists, less tension between social classes, and religious revival due to the Great awakening which ultimately lead to a greater union between the colonists and prepared them for the revolution.
1. Great Awakening
2. Queen Anne's War
3. King George's War
4. War of Jenkins's Ear
5. Founding of Yale and Princeton

Although King George's war asserted British dominance on the North American continent with the defeat of the French and Spanish, its treaty also returned Louisburg to the French after New Englanders had fought for it; this event increased tension between Britain and the colonists and discouraged expansion by colonists but encouraged a greater colonial unity and growth.

1750's
Change:

1760's
Change: After Britain abandoned the policy of salutary neglect towards the colonies the motherland experienced a time of contempt because Britain would not extend representation to the colonists, the taxing policy was unfair and excessive on the colonists, and the colonists' privacy and natural rights were accosted. This growing discontent led to the minority war of the American Revolution in which the decade ended with American freedom in sight.
1. American Revolution
2. Declaration of Independence
3. Thomas Paine's Common Sense
Battles of Lexington and Concord
5. Olive Branch Petition

In order to get more of the colonists on the side of the rebels, Thomas Paine published his pamphlet, Common Sense, which showed colonists how the King conducted unfair policies over the colonies.

1770's
Change: Increasing American resistance to British laws passed to stop what the British viewed as colonial misbehavior eventually leads to the outbreak of the Revolutionary War with superior American strategy and geography advantages in addition to French assistance helping the American victory.
1. Lexington and Concord
2. Boston Tea Party
3. Coercive/Intolerable Acts
4. Stamp Act
5. Battle of Gettysburg

The Boston Tea Party was caused by Britain giving a monopoly to the East India Tea Company where the Americans had an outbreak against Britain's taxation policies.

1780's
Change: Although America now had independence from Britain, this period marked a time of stress and confusion over the thought of federal stability v. state government, there were a number of continued rebellion and foreign issues.
1. The Articles of Confederation
2. Shay's Rebellion
3. Barbary Pirates
4. West Coast Controversy
5. Three-Fifths compromise

The Articles of Confederation provided America with a weak national government and strong state governments as well as a Congress that hosted for equal representation in all states.

1790's
Change: Throughout this period a fledgling nation proved its strength by overcoming a bunch of rebellions and other major crises and conducted the first peaceful transition of power between two leaders in the election of 1796.
1. The Election of Adams in the 1796 election
2. Whiskey Rebellion
3. Fries' Rebellion
4. Alien and Sedition Acts
5. Yellow fever pandemic in Philadelphia

The election of 1796 showed the first peaceful transition of power in history which proves the theory of democracy and rule by the people through an elected leader.

1800's
Change: This decade marked the first ever peaceful change between political parties and the US began to settle in by further expanding its boundaries, manufacturing and the start of the fight to eliminate slavery.
1. The election of Thomas Jefferson
2. Congress bans the importation of slaves in 1807
3. The Embargo of 1807
4. The Louisiana Purchase of 1803
5. The Lewis and Clark Expedition

The Embargo of 1807, though meant to keep America out of a war with France and Great Britain, resulted in a US need to self-reproduce. The embargo essentially helped nurture US manufacturing and allow it to stand on its own. America was thus less dependent on foreign countries.

1810's
Change:

1820's
Change: This decade showed American advancement to more nationalistic feelings led mainly by President Monroe, who headed this Era of Good Feelings in a hope to stick with original Washington ideals to make a whole government without fractions that could endure the growing differences between the North and South.
1. Monroe doctrine
2. Missouri compromise
3. The addition of Maine and Missouri as states
4. American Colonization society
5. Democratic Party forms

The Monroe Doctrine claimed that Europe can no longer colonize America which also came with the addition of two new states.

1830's
Change: This decade was characterized by the presidency of Andrew Jackson with revolutionized the role of the federal government by his use of almost dictatorial powers which exercised the authority of the central government; the abolition movement gained ground under the leadership of Frederick Douglass and other abolitionist sources such as William Lloyd Garrison.
1. Nullification Crisis
2. Ending of the 2nd National Bank
3. Indian removal Act
4. Specie Circular
5. Abolition movement

The Nullification Crisis showed Jackson was not afraid to use his presidential power and weight to end dissent, which set the tone for his authoritative terms as president.

1840's
Change: During the 1840's the US was initially an isolationist country but became increasingly involved in foreign affairs close to home due to the beliefs provided by manifest destiny, creating tensions with Mexico and Japan; internal conflict and controversy also grew over the issue of slavery which led up to the civil war.
1. Manifest Destiny
2. Mexican War
3. Treaty of Wanghai
4. Frederick Douglass and his battle for Civil Rights
5. Texas Annexed

The Treaty of Wanghai signified an increase in the U.S.'s part in foreign relations; which showed how a once very internally focused country suddenly concentrated on other countries, namely China, and how aggressive America had become in its negotiations.

1850's
Change: The pre-Civil war decade marked the extremities of the factions of the US Government over the issue of slavery and how compromises, literature, court decisions, riots and protests, an economic depression, and even political beatings could not stop the issue of slavery rom causing the Confederacy to secede from the Union.
1. "Bleeding Kansas"
2. Compromise of 1850
3. Kansas-Nebraska Act
4. Sumer-Brooks Incident
5. Dred Scott v. Sanford

"Bleeding Kansas" was the miniature wars in Kansas between ploslavery forces and abolitionists, especially the attacks by John Brown. Massacres occurred between these two groups foreshadowing the civil war

1860's
Change: The Republican party, led by Abraham Lincoln, pledged to preserve the Union, to fight slavery, and to begin the reconstruction of the South after the end of the war.
1. The passage of the Emancipation Proclamation
2. The assassination of Abraham Lincoln
3. The passage of the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments
4. Reconstruction
5. General Ulysses S. Grant

The ratification of the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments proclaimed the rights of slaves and validated the views and works of Abraham Lincoln.

1870's
Change: The 1870s is also known as the Gilded Age showed a post-Civil War mayhem of mass corruption in the economy and government which weakened the government's power over the states and created disorder within the systems that the government of the US relied on to maintain stability.
1. Spoils system
2. Credit Mobilizer
3. Trusts, Monopolies, and big businesses
4. Ulysses S. Grant
5. Panic of 1873

To meet greater social mobility people took steps to climb social ranks such as earning a government job. Money and publicity would be used to gain jobs which left the government with unskilled workers, this basically defines the spoils system.

1880's
Change: Throughout this decade, America saw many shifts in power from the Republican to Democratic party and also saw new reform legislations that would directly impact the future ties between politics and big business and industry as well as politics and labor groups and farmers.
1. The election of Grover Cleveland
2. Pendleton Act of 1883
3. Interstate Commerce Act
4. American Federation of Labor
5. Farmers alliances

The Interstate Commerce Act allowed the federal government to regulate interstate commerce rather than having industries do so.

1890's
Change: This decade signified a time where political groups became more radical, migration was at its peak and there was a bigger focus on gold, and the growth of military power and influence.
1. Western settlement
2. Spanish-American War
3. Panic of 1893
4. Homestead Act
5. McKinley Tariff Act

The Panic of 1893 showed how the increased dependence on gold could affect the economy. The focus on gold caused over speculation until the stock market crashed.

1900's
Change: The US inherited a controversial yet popular theroy of political orientation that seemed to stand as a protective and defensive doctrine, but in truth favored imperialist ideas to better the conditions of society while remaining hidden behind this captured defense. Citizens began questioning this when they could not justify it giving way to the emergence of true progressives and new literature.
1. Russo-Japanese Treaty
2. Platt Amendment
3. Meat and Inspection Act
4. Trust busting
5. Great White Fleet

With the emergence of the progressives also came critical problems with resources, a big one being meat. Meat would be unlabeled, outdated, and contained dangerous chemicals. When citizens realized this they protested and the Mean and Inspection Act was passed enforcing inspection of meat for all large producing meat companies.

1910's
Change: America is now considered a world leader as the issues with immigration and poverty, labor and monopoly struggles, and work safety and child labor ends. World War One really helped in boosting Americas economy.
1. WWI
2.Ratification of 19th amendment
3. "New Immigrants"
4. Assembly lines
5. End of Progressive Era

WWI was the climax of the Progressive Era which reverted it back to its isolationist status by the end of the was.  America was a world power by the end of the war as well as socially altered back at home with women in the workforce and more minority rights.

1920's
Change: The 1920's experienced profound cultural changes including modern philosophies portrayed in the increased independence of women in their style, traditionalist and modernist conflicts, music influences from African Americans, and anti-prohibitionist groups.
1. Scoped Trial
2. Harlem Renaissance
3. Nativism
4. Flappers
5. Prohibition

The prominent style of young women of this decade was the flapper style which helped increase the acceptances of sexual promiscuity of women and he independence and equality of women challenging the traditional, modest view of women.

1930's
Change: The 1930's was a period of economic and international turbulence aas the United States was struck by both a failing stock market and deteriorating control over foeign threats that would eventually lead to the Second World War. It was defined by the reform legislation and a movement towards worldwide peace which is unattained.
1. The Great Depression
2. Roosevelt's New Deals
3. Isolationism
4. The Dust Bowl
5. Invasion of Poland in 1939

Both the first and second New Deals introduced new welfare legislation to help the country through labor and economic growth. Components of these included Social Security and the Fair Labor Act.

1940's
Change: This decade saw an era of war production and migration where the US was able to pull out of the Great Depression, experience new ideas in art and culture, and exit the idea of isolationism by building up alliances with the nations in Europe while Eruope experiences a time of great loss and dependency on unity.
1. Hitler
2. The Holocaust
3. NATO
4. Marshall Plan
War Production Board

The Holocaust showed the allies how terrible Hitler and the Nazi's were giving them a common enemy while the mass exodus of Jews marked a new era for culture changes and integration in many different countries.

1950's
Change: The US moved away from the postwar desire of calm atmospheres to more interventionist actions, especially against communism, abroad and increasing awareness of social and political issues at home.
1. Korean War
2. "dynamic conservatism"
3. Brown v. Board of Education
4. Massive Retaliation
5. Domino theory

The Domino theory claimed that if one country fell to communism then all surrounding would then also fall to it creating this domino effect of communism.

1960's
Change: In this time period America had a grat change in its relationship with other nations during the Cold War. This shaped future USnpolicies towards acting and reacting in global situations.
1. Cuban Missile Crisis
2. Bay of Pigs Invasion
3. Gulf of Tonkin Incident
4. Korean War
5. Dominican Republic action

The Cuban Missile Crisis was a very alarming situation for Americans and lead to future developments to avoid ever having threats as close as this. This Crisis was essentially that the Soviet Union brought a nuclear missile into Cuba which could be activated at any time and directed towards the USA.

1970's
Change: Domestic reform was on the rise and policies from environmental issues to highway control were affected.
1. 26th amendment
2. Inflation increase
3. US gas embargo
4. Emergency Conservation highway act
5. EPA is passed

With inflation and unemployment on the rise, the US begins to focus on internal issues rather than foreign ones.

1980's
Change: Throughout the 1980's, President Reagan's conservatism and Reagonomics caused unemployment, recession, and excessive military expenditures; thus, the larger military intensified the Cold War, and there were more foreign policy issues with Muslim extremist groups near the end of the 80's.
1. Tax cuts
2. Excessive military spending
3. Recession of 1982
4. Muslims taking American hostages
5. "New right" movement

The excessive military spending and tax cuts lead to the Recession of 1982 which involved the rise of unemployment and more tension with the Soviet Union.

1990's
Change: During this decade America grew intellectually with the era of Technology creating a booming economy; improved domestically with numerous legislation passed, and influenced foreign policy with the creation of the world Trade Organization.
1. Iraq invades Kuwait which puts America into getting involved in the Gulf War
2. The Gulf War ends
3. NAFTA goes into effect
4. WTO created
5. Iraq Liberation Act

With the creation of the World Trade Organization, America's trade with other countries was stabilized with the establishment of set rules of trade among nations.

2000's
Change: During the start of the 21st century, United States lifestyle was changed by catastrophes, such as the 9/11 bombings leading to the war on terrorism; and an economical change, much like that of the stock over speculation in 1929, from the thriving economy early in the decade to a crash with the over speculation of mortgage rates.
1. Mortgage Crisis of 2007
2. 9/11 terrorist bombings
3. Iraqi war
4. War on Terrorism
5. American recovery and Readjustment Act

The Mortgage Crisis was the first time in almost 80 years that the US had such a drop in the economic situation as it had been thriving since post WWII.

Chapter 38

1960 Election:
1. TV debates
2. Religion
3. MLK Jr. released from jail
Republican candidate: Richard Nixon
Democrat candidate: John F. Kennedy. although he was catholic he still believed in separation of church and state
Results: 49.7%-Kennedy; 49.5%- Nixon
Kennedy was more concerned on foreign policy during his presidency but not too much on the domestic front. Kennedy did want new, fresh cabinet members. His brother, an uninformed Bobby Kennedy, was made the Attorney General without law practice.
His inaugural address was very famous nd helped third world countries.
NASA: wanted the first man on the moon by the end of the decade.
Stuff passed:

• The Trade Expansion Act of 1962 lowered tariffs.
• Alliance for progress: Marshall plan for Latin countries was supposed to give aid and money to latin countries to help get rid of communism. As America got more involved elsewhere the amount of money promised wasn't given.
• Peace Corps: strove for friendly foreign alliances. young, idealistic Americans would go to third world nations to help out and teach. Usually the fields were health, agriculture, languages and math.
• Housing Act and Area Redevelopment Act- more federal spending for urban renewal.
• 1963: Equal Pay Act: abolished pay differences between sexes and races.

He attempts to apply minimum wage to minorities like women.
His Domestic Program was called the NEW FRONTEIR.
In November 1963 JFK was shot on the neck in Texas, then blasted in the skull and died. Lee Harvey Oswald (communistic ties) was the suspect but he was killed by another man named Ruby. The Warren commission said Oswald acted alone.
Michael Herrington: "The Other America"

Civil Rights Movement

• Freedom Riders (191) would challenge segregation of busses and railways. 18 freedom riders went from May to September on a trip facing resistance and violenve. On May 14th a mob of white racists surrounded a bus of Freedom riders and threw in a bomb while blocking exits. The riders escaped but were attacked.
• James Meredith 1962: wants to enroll in a University but is met with violence, Marshalls sent by JFK were attacked and troops were sent in.
• "Moral Issue"/ Civil Rights act 1963
• Birmingham, AL 1963- MLK knows he can protest peacefully here but he also knows the sheriff uses violent methods against protesters. He was thrown in jail and wrote his nonviolent letters that said protesters must accept penalties and made whites look bad.

Foreign Policy

• Bay of Pigs Invasion 1961 (Cuba): attempt to overthrow Castro, but they're ready for our invasion. No success. Kennedy backs off with US air support. He says this is his bad to the country.
• Berlin Crisis (1961) Khrushchev- Berlin wall is being built separating east and west berlin. JFK increases military size. Heats up Cold War
• Cuban Missile Crisis (1962) US spy planes spot Soviet missiles and troops in Cuba. Now we have Soviet weapons and troops on our doorstep. JFK gives the scariest speech ever. We bring in US ships and surround Cuba (we quarantine them). Crisis is put down and Khrushchev turns around. We stopped a nuclear war and missiles are taken out of Cuba. We promise not to invade Cuba and we take missiles out of Turkey which we were going to do anyways.
• Hotline established in 1963. red telephones with direct line to DC and Moscow.
• Nuclear Test Ban treaty: no more atmospheric testing of nuclear weapons
• Vietnam: fear of communism and domino effect of it. 16,000 advisors. 1963-65 Johnson comes in and Tonkin Gulf resolution doesn't allow us to pull everyone out by 1965. Public kept in dark about it. 1964 LBJ makes statements that white boys wont be sent to Vietnam to do Asians jobs. He does it anyways during his presidency.

LBJ and Civil Rights

1. The Gulf of Tonkin Incident: In August 1964, there was the Gulf of Tonkin Incident. There, two U.S. warships had been attacked by the North Vietnamese. In response, the Tonkin Gulf Resolution was passed by Congress essentially giving the president a blank check for return action.

1. Summarize or make a bullet-point list of the information on JFK’s foreign policy


2. Briefly take notes on the following: SNCC, freedom rides, Birmingham protests and Bull Connor, Letter from Birmingham Jail, Medgar Evers, March on Washington, Civil Rights Act of 1964, Freedom Summer, Selma, Voting Rights Act of 1965.How did the civil rights movement change in this period?  Why did racial and civil unrest turn violent? Make sure you include Malcolm X, Black Muslims, Stokely Carmichael, Black Panthers, long hot summers


3. Make a list of the Great Society programs.  Make sure you know what each one did.  How can we assess Johnson’s domestic program?

4. What was the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution?  Why didn’t the escalation of American involvement in the War succeed?How did the conduct of the Vietnam War affect American domestic affairs?What was the impact of the Tet offensive on American morale and politics

 

Discussion Questions- Chapter 37

1. The 1950s is sometimes known as the "age of anxiety". What were the major sources of anxiety and conflict that stirred beneath the surface of the time?
Some major sources of anxiety included the fear of the atomic bomb or any bomb in general being dropped in America. America also had a large fear of communism since countries like North Korea and China were being taken over and converted to communism. The Cold War was also a constant threat to Americans as well as the Nuclear Arms race. When the Soviets put a dog in space we knew that they could also deliver a nuclear weapon to the U.S. using intercontinental ballistic missiles. McCarthyism is also a source of anxiety since McCarthy is so charismatic and is accusing a lot of people of being communists. We see the formation of the House of Un-American Activities. Politicians were being accused, like George Marshall.  U2 Incident where our spy plane was shot down by the soviets since we spied on them and they got our technology. Americans had to be told.

 2. How did Eisenhower balance assertiveness and restraint in his foreign policies in Vietnam, Europe, and the Middle East?
Brinkmanship created by John Foster Dulles is a key in Eisenhower's foreign policy. we have to liberate any country that is under communist pressures. We have to show some restraint.
Eisenhower wanted to ease the tension with Stalin's successor Nikita Khrushchev but he was blocked out.
At Dienbienphu in 1954 France was surrounded and lost so they simply left Southeast Asia which created a void allowing communism to grow there. This battle marks the real beginning of America's interest in Vietnam.
Ike also asked at the peace conference for a reduction of arms Khrushchev was receptive and also publicly denounced the atrocities of Stalin. When the soviets rolled tanks into the Hungary rebellion and crushed them while they protested communists, the US gave no aid which showed the Cold War would continue.
Eisenhower sent military aid to Korea.
The US worried Russia would invade the Middle East for its oil so the CIA pulled off a coup in Iran and placed Mohammed Reza Pahlevi in charge as a dictator. It was successful for the time but it came back to get America.
In Egypt, Gamal Abdel Nassar wanted to build a dam on the Nile so America and Britain offered some help, but then Nasser began to flirt with communism. Sec. Dulles removed the US offer and Nassar took over the Suez canal so they could make money for the Nile, which threated the oil supply to the West. Britain and France attacked Egypt without our knowledge so Eisenhower wouldn't supply oil to Britain and France so they had to withdraw. In 1940 the US produced 2/3 of the worlds oil but by 1948 the US was a net importer of oil. Ike and Congress also declared the Eisenhower Doctrine which promised to help the Middle-east if it was threatened by communism .The real threat in the middle-east was the oil. Deterrence!

 3. In what ways was the Eisenhower era a time of caution and conservatism and in what ways was it a time of dynamic economic, social, cultural change?
This era marked a huge fear of an attack by nuclear/atom bombs as well as communism. Eisenhower attempted to be more liberal towards the people and more conservative with money.Social changes included a change in education from music, arts, etc to mathematics and science.The National defense and Education Act provided millions of dollars in college loans to teach science and languages. Ike didn't embrace the infant civil rights movement.

Chapter 36 Classwork

https://docs.google.com/document/d/12QzLTzsrAh5J10rNEnm1s58S_c59WrZDKIKWMcqSf-4/edit?usp=sharing

A Tale of Three Cities

 

A Tale of Three Cities Reading Questions

 

1. The author pursues several questions at the beginning of the lecture. On what premise does he aim to “establish a position?”

The author aims to establish a position on the premise that World War II "constituted a massively transformative event, for both the United States and the world”. This is supported by by the choice America made in the type of war it would fight and the lasting legacy of American belligerence.

2. Professor Kennedy states that in order “to understand the full scope of the war’s transformative agency”, one needs to look at the tears 1940 to 1945. What did he bring up about 1940 to set the scene?

To set the scene, Kennedy brought up that in 1940, America was in its last full peacetime year, and still mostly entrenched in an atmosphere of isolationism, shown by the passing of the Neutrality Acts in 1935, 1936, and 1937, among other prominent examples. 1940 was also the eleventh year of the Great Depression, and more than 40% of all white households and 95% of all African American households lived in poverty.

3. Read the statement by the imaginary street corner speaker. What seemed most farfetched to you?

Of the statements professed by the imaginary street corner speaker, the most far fetched seeming to me, based in the perspective of America, 1940, were claims such as the doubling of the middle class (doubtful-seeming due to the increase in the wage gap between the lavishly rich and desolately poor), the promises of racial equality, and the magnitude of the United States’ future intervention with Europe, including the winning of the war with Germany and Japan, the United Nations, the Marshall Plan, and the World Trade Organization.

4. When the US got involved in the war in 1941, what were some differing opinions about how the war would turn out?

The attack of Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 prompted US entry into the war. Hitler, hearing the news from Hawaii, boasted that “now it is impossible for us to lose the war. We now have an ally [Japan] that has not been vanquished in three thousand years.”. However, Winston Churchill responded to America’s entry into the war with a contradictory conclusion, quoted as  saying later, “I could not foretell the course of events… but now at this very moment I knew the United States was in the war, up to the neck and in to the death. So we had won after all! England would live… I went to bed and slept the sleep of the saved and thankful.”.

5. Professor Kennedy calls this a “tale of three cities.” To which three cities does he refer?

In the title “A Tale of Three Cities”, Professor Kennedy is referring to Rouen, a French city on the Seine, Washington DC, on the Potomac, and Volgograd, formerly known as both Tsaritsyn and Stalingrad.

6. What happened at Rouen and what were its implications for the war?

A squadron of one dozen B-17 bombers lifted off their airfield in the South of England, and transited the Channel accompanied by a swarm of British Spitfire fighters. They dropped their bomb load on a railroad marshaling yard, just a few hundred meters from Rouen’s historic Gothic cathedral and not far from the site where Joan of Arc had been burned at the stake some five centuries earlier. The planes returned to base without any loss of aircraft or crew meaning it was a successful raid. This marked the first assault on Nazi-occupied Europe by heavy bombers of the US Army Air Forces. This was a revolution in American war-fighting doctrine. It created a new doctrine for strategic aerial bombing and deliver a blow to the domestic heartland rather to the troops. This would deprive the enemy of his capacity to support a force in the field and to break the people’s will to continue fighting. It signaled a brief war and fewer casualties as well as minimum disruption of one’s own social and economic structure.

7. Who was Paul Tibbets?

Paul Tibbets was the lead pilot for the Rouen raid in 1942. Almost three years later he served as the pilot on the flight of the Enola Gay from Tinian, in the Mariana Islands, to drop history’s first atomic bomb on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945.

 

8. What decision was made in Washington D.C. and how did it affect the outcome of the war?

On October 6, 1942 the civilian head of the American War Production Board, Donald Nelson, met in in his office with Army Undersecretary Robert Patterson and Lieutenant General Brehon B. Somervell , head of the Army Service forces. The were to resolve the “Feasibility Dispute” which plagued America’s mobilization program through 1942, and generated antagonisms between military officials like Patterson and Somervell and civilian mobilization administrators like Nelson. The terms for this would all but complete the pattern of america’s peculiar war. The chaotic mobilization effort in early 1942 would be slowed down and its prospectively gigantic military manpower drafts would be drastically downsized.

9. What two “fateful” consequences followed this decision?

First, the target date for the Cross-Channel amphibious invasion of northwestern France, D-Day, was postponed to May 1, 1944. Second the Victory Program’s goal of conscripting, out-fitting, training, transporting, and deploying 215 ground divisions was put down to just 90 divisions. The dimensions of this were immense: millions of men who had originally been destined to don uniforms and shoulder weapons on the battlefield would now be left in overalls to wield tools on the nation’s production lines.

10. What happened at Stalingrad that contributed the outcome of the war?

This event slaughtered tens of thousands of German and Soviet troops. The German capitulation at Stalingrad in February 1943 broke the back of the Wehrmacht’s 18 month old Russian offensive. The Red Army now seized the initiative and began pushing the invader out of the Soviet homeland, through Poland, and eventually into the streets of Berlin in 1942. This Soviet victory ended the Anglo-American leaders fear that the Russians could not withstand the shock of heavily-armored, fast-moving Blitzkrieg warfare.It also laid to rest the fear that their Soviet partner might be so badly battered and bloded by the fighting that Stalin would be compelled to seek political exit from the war. The Soviets turning from defensive to offensive warfare turned the war around by committing to pursuing the battle until the extinguishment of the Nazy Regime.

11. How did Joseph Stalin describe the American way of war?

Joseph Stalin had his own description for the American way of war: the United States, he commented bitterly, seemed to have decided to fight with American money, and American machines, and with Russian men. That was a characteristically cynical and tactless formulation; it was also indisputably accurate.

12. Describe how the author contends that the United States was the only “true victor” from the war.

The war-fighting pattern had far-reaching and lasting consequences. Among other things, it made the US the only true victor in the war, if by victory we mean emerging at the war’s end in a position superior to that occupied at the war’s onset. Ironically, but not unrelatedly, the US paid the smallest price in both blood and treasure for the victory that it so singularly achieved. If one asks, “Who made the weightiest contribution to the defeat of Nazi Germany?” the answer is unarguably the Soviet Union. But the Soviets were not the only ones who reaped the richest rewards from their own effort. Franklin Roosevelt’s “arsenal of democracy” strategy, in short, with its implications for the scale, configuration, and timing of the American war effort, amounted to a shrewdly calculated “least-cost” pathway to victory for the United States.

13. Why does the profit made by Macy’s on December 7th, 1944 seem incredible to Professor Kennedy?

Macy’s marketing team hit upon the poignantly symbolic date of December 7th, 1944 to promote a chain-wide sale. Only in America, it might be remarked, would a vendor choose to seek commercial advantage by commemorating the date of the nation’s most humiliating military defeat. But more to the point, only in wartime America could Macy’s results have been achieved. On that day Americans were engaged in the most ferocious fighting of the war, yet Macy’s cash registers rang up a higher volume of sales than on any previous day in the giant retailer’s history. There was no other country engaged in WWII where such a thing could have happened.

14. Compare the United States war and civilian dead to that of other countries. Why was this an important factor in postwar growth?

There was another implication of the US’s war-fighting strategy that has often been overlooked: the war’s toll in human life. Great Britain, America’s first partner nation in what became the Grand Alliance, lost some 350,000 people to enemy action, of whom about 100,000 were civilians. China may have lost as many as 10 million people, about 6 million of them civilians. Yugoslavia lost 2 million people, most of them civilians. Poles perished in the war, 6 million of them civilians (of whom perhaps 4 million were Jews). Six and a half million Germans died, about 1 million of them civilians. Japan lost some 3 million souls, 1 million of them civilian. In the Soviet Union, estimates are that the war took some 24 million lives, including 16 million civilians. And as for the United States: official records list 405,399 military dead in all branches of service, and 6 civilians died.

15. How does the author use the story about the Japanese balloon offensive to conclude his lecture?

Comparing the instrumentalities and results of the respective Japanese and American strategic bombing campaigns provides a summary illustration of the unique means by which America waged and won WWII. While Japan in the first half of 1945 adapted a primitive wind-driven technology in a last pathetic effort to strike at the Americans in their heartland, huge B-29 bomber streams flew nightly to Japan from the Marianas. The B-29s eventually razed 66 of Japan’s principal cities, de-housed some 8 million souls, and killed more than 800,000 people. Just two of those B-29s effectively ended the Japanese-American war, compared to Japan’s futile balloon bombs.

 



Reading class review 1939-1941

1. How and why did the US attempt to isolate itself from foreign troubles in the enemy and mid-1930's?
Why: Because of the horrors and economic consequences of World War I. We wanted to avoid the whole dilemma.

• The Neutrality Acts of 35, 36, and 37. (Does not distinguish b/w the aggressor and victim)
• Spanish civil war is a dress rehearsal for WWII.
• Panay Incident
• Johnston Debt Default Act - no loans
• Nye Committee
• We didn't respond to Italy invading Ethiopia.
• The America First Committee.
• Neutrality Act of 1939
• Cash and carry act.
• Good Neighbor Policy
• America First Committee

2. How did the fascist dictators' continually expand in aggression gradually erode the US commitment to neutrality and isolationism?
The Quarantine Speech took a step away from neutrality in that he asked American's to side against the dictators.
Mussolini comes to power.
The Munich Conference- form of appeasement or giving in to assure it as the last act of aggression.
3. How did FDR manage to move the US toward providing effective aid to Britain while slowly undercutting isolationist opposition?
Neutrality of 1939 where the US can sell arms on a cash and carry basis. A draft was also made to build armed forces. The creation of the committee to defend the allies which was started by regular Americans. The destroyer deal where the US transferred 50 US destroyers to Great Britain. The Lend Lease bill and the Atlantic Conference.

America's first peacetime draft. It would train 1.2 million troops yearly and 800,000 reserves.

 

Hard Travelin' Commentary

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8jFiw8YAT9zX2lGT3FLNU9VcXc/view?usp=sharing