CHAPTER 28 WORLD WAR AND COMPETING VISIONS OF MODERNITY TO 1945

New Variations on Modernity: Supremacist Nationalism in Italy,

Germany, and Japan

• Bunito Mussolini was an anarchist who founded the Italian Combat Squad, or Fascists.

• Created paramilitary organizations of war veterans who opposed Communists.

• Fascists “Blackshirts” used violence to intimidate the king into making Mussolini premier in 1922.

• Once in office, Mussolini used more threats of violence to consolidate power.

• By 1926 Mussolini controlled the press, used a secret police, and had ended all elections.

• In the Lateran Accords of 1926–1929, the Catholic Church and Mussolini exchanged mutual support.

• In 1933, the Fascists rebuilt Italy’s small industrial sector.

• Mussolini rebuilt the Italian military, and conquered Libya and Ethiopia.

• Mussolini rebuilt the Italian military, and conquered – Libya – Ethiopia.

Fascism as an ideology . . .

• Anti-modern• Anti-democratic• Highly nationalistic

and militaristic• Emphasis on the Leader• Economic policy: private ownership,

qqgovernment direction• Elimination of opposition• Racist (in Germany)

Germany• The Weimar Republic ruled Germany from 1918 to 1933 and was initially

crippled with war reparations.

• The Paris settlement required Germany to pay for civilian losses in the First World War.

• Rampant consumer spending led to hyperinflation.• When Germany could not make her reparations payments, France and

Belgium occupied the industrial Ruhr province.

• The United States drafted the Dawes Plan of 1924: – the United States loaned Europe money– Germany’s reparations reduced– Ruhr returned to Germany.

• Stock market crash in the United States led American banks to recall European loans and to an economic depression in Germany.

• German unemployment was high, and people turned to outsider political parties:– Communists and the Nazi Party.

• Nazi party led by Adolph Hitler, who blamed Jews, Communists, and the Allies for Germany’s loss in World War I and the economic crisis.– Advocated war against Slavs in Eastern Europe to get land for

Germany to expand– Lebensraum

• Hitler became chancellor in 1933 when the Nazi party won a plurality in parliament.– First targeted Communist party, then made

alliance with the Catholic Church.– Imitated Mussolini’s approach to controlling

journalists and political parties.– Created the SS, a secret police engaged in

surveillance of Germans.– Hitler used nationalism, propaganda, and

economic recovery to gain popular support.

Adolph Hitler, 1888-1945• Austrian by birth.• Moved to Vienna - a failed artist.• Joined a Bavarian infantry regiment in 1914.• Served honorably and bravely.– Wounded– Iron Cross

• An ordinary man with great will and significant communications skills who need to belong to something.

Hitler’s rise to power . . .

• Joins Nazi Party in 1919.• A great public speaker.• Rises to party leadership.• 1923 - the “Munich Putsch.”• Imprisoned for treason– Writes Mein Kampf

(My Struggle)– Outlines his plans for Germany and the world.

Hitler’s goals . . .

• Lebensraum

• Racial purityAryans vs. untermensch

European Anti-Semitism• Medieval Europe:– Jews seen by Christians as “killers of Christ.” – Jews generally prohibited from owning land.– Jews forced into occupations outside the feudal

model.• banking and finance• professions

• Jewish culture:– Highly cohesive– Education and intellect primary cultural values

European Anti-Semitism• Medieval Europe:– First serious persecutions begin in the wake of the

First Crusade.

• Jews expelled from Spain in 1492.• By mid-1800’s, two views of Jews:– Wealthy controllers of international

finance.– Poverty-stricken mongrels.

European Anti-Semitism• Theodore Hertzel founds Zionist Movement.• 1905, Protocols of the Elders of Zion.• Major overt persecution in Russia.• During WWI, Austrian and German Jews strongly

nationalistic.• German-speaking Jews some

of the most integrated Jews in Europe.

NAZI anti-Semitism . . .

• Concept of the “Aryan Race” central to Nazism.

• Jews seen as ultimate polluters of racial purity.• Jews associated with Communists

(Marx was a Jew)

• Jews helped “stab Germany in the back.”

• Germany covertly rearmed in 1935, and participated in the Spanish Civil War.– Incorporated Austria into Germany.– British and French leaders met with Hitler in

Munich, 1938, and agreed to let him have the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia.

– 15 March 1939 Germany occupies all of Czechoslovakia

• August 1939 Hitler signs a nonaggression pact with Stalin and the Soviet Union.

• Hitler begins his push for lebensraum, or living space, by invading Poland.

• The joint German and Soviet invasion of Poland led Britain and France to declare war on Germany.

• Germany avoids a two-front war by quickly defeating Poland and France.– The French were quickly defeated– Germany went around the Maginot Line

• British and French troops fled at Dunkirk and France was divided and occupied by Germany.

• Hitler was unable to conquer Britain, who was led by Churchill.

• In 1941 Hitler invaded the Soviet Union, surprising his ally Stalin.

– Although the Soviets unprepared for war, they outnumbered Germans.

– In 1943 Germany was stopped near the Caspian and forced to retreat.

• Hitler had already implemented the Final Solution, an attempt to eradicate all Jews in Europe.

• Two-thirds of European Jews were killed in extermination camps.

Victims Killed

Jews 5.9 millionSoviet POWs 2–3 millionEthnic Poles 1.8–2 million

Romani 220,000–1,500,000Disabled 200,000–250,000

Freemasons 80,000–200,000Slovenes 20,000–25,000

Homosexuals 5,000–15,000Jehovah's Witnesses 2,500–5,000

• Allied counteroffensive began in North Africa, in 1942.– Industrial strength of the United States forced

Germans to retreat in southern Europe.– The United States out-produced Germany in tanks and

aircraft.

• The United States and Britain used “around the clock” bombing of German cities.

• Soviets advanced in the East, and Germany surrendered on May 8, 1945.

Germany lost.

• In the interwar years, Japan instituted universal male suffrage, and increased militarization.

• Concern about communism led to the Peace Preservation Act of 1925.– Limited the actions of labor union and leftists.– Recognized a “national essence” that was

protected by a secret police.

• For a decade Japan had manipulated China by controlling Chinese warlords.

– The 1911 revolution overthrew Qing dynasty and created a republic led by Sun Yat-sen.

– Sun’s policies were:• nationalism• democracy• land reform.

– Led the GMD, or Chinese Nationalist Party.

– Rivaled by the CCP, or Chinese Communist Party.

Sun Yat-sen (1866-1925)

Chiang Kai-shek(1887-1975)

Mao Zedong(1893-1976)

• Two parties worked together until Chiang K’ai-shek took over the Nationalists.– Chiang purged the Nationalists of the Communists in 1927.– Communists led by Mao Zedong, who transformed Marxism into

rural communism.

• Chiang builds railroads but fails to reform land ownership, providing a base of support for Mao.

• Chiang forces the Communists into the Long March of 6000 miles from the south toward Beijing.

• Communists used the threat of Japan to increase their support.

• Japan annexed Manchuria in 1931, creating a puppet state with the last Qing emperor, Pu Yi, on the throne.

• From Manchuria, Japan launched an invasion of China in 1937.

• The Chinese capital of Nanking was seized in December 1937, and 300,000 people were killed – Rape was used as a systematic weapon.

• Japan’s aggression encouraged the Chinese resolve to fight back.

Pu Yi (1906-1967)

Hirohito (1901-1981)

• Nationalists and Communist used guerilla tactics against the Japanese.

• After Hitler invaded France in 1940, Japan decided to build a Pacific empire.– Needed natural resources such as oil, rubber, and metals, which had to imported.– 1941, Japan’s Tojo authorized an attack on the U.S. fleet at Pearl Harbor,– Hawaii, and on the Philippines and British territory.

• The U.S. mobilized against Japan, and began a strategy of island hopping to force the Japanese to retreat to Japan.

• In 1945 major Japanese cities were firebombed.

• August 1945, the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

• When the Soviets invaded Manchuria, the Japanese surrendered.