The Road to War

Ch. 17.4

pp. 585-589

Neutrality

• Focus on domestic concerns

• Great Depression, unemployment, New Deal programs

• FDR seeking re-election in 1940

• Bitter taste left from WWI

• History of isolationism

Neutrality Acts

• 1935—Banned U.S. from providing weapons to belligerent nations

• 1936—Banned loans to belligerent nations

• 1937—Permitted trade w/ belligerent nations, but Cash & Carry only

• Didn’t help countries fighting aggression

• U.S. was part of the appeasement problem

Europe in 1940

Some action!

• Built military bases on British possessions in

the Atlantic

– In exchange for 50 destroyers given to Brits

– Ended neutrality by doing this!

• Congress increased defense spending and

had a peacetime draft

– Selective Service & Training Act—Sept. 1940

• 1st ever peacetime draft

• Ages 21-35; later 18-45

• U.S. had 2.2 million sailors & soldiers by Dec. 1941

• Roughly 10 million inducted via draft during WWII

Election of 1940

• FDR ran for an unprecedented 3rd term– Not a constitutional amendment yet (22nd/1947)

• Wendell Willkie, lawyer & industrialist, no political experience, darkhorse candidate, flip-flopped on American intervention in WWII, very critical of FDR’s New Deal & his attempt at a 3rd term

• WWII was central issue

• FDR did esp. well in large urban areas

Election of 1940

Lend-Lease Act

• After winning election of 1940

• President had power to lease, lend, or

otherwise dispose of arms and other

equipment whose defense was considered

vital to the security of the US

• When Germany invaded the Soviets in

1941, they expanded the program to them

Four Freedoms Speech

• FDR’s State of the Union speech; Jan. 1941

• Four fundamental freedoms that people

everywhere should enjoy

– Freedom of speech

– Freedom of worship

– Freedom from want

– Freedom from fear

• Became a basis for war aims

• An attempt to gain public support

Atlantic Charter

• FDR and Churchill

• Ideological foundation of the Western

cause

• Similar to Fourteen Points in that it:

• Called for economic collaboration

• Guarantees of political stability

• Free trade, national self-determination,

collective security

Opposition to War

• America First Committee

– 800 K members in 1940

– Hoped to block further aid to Britain

– Charles Lindbergh=spokesperson

Japan/Pearl Harbor

• In July of 1940 FDR limited sale of supplies to Japan

– Steel, iron

• Hoped to limit Japanese aggression; didn’t work

• Later cut off all oil shipments

• War seemed inevitable

Japan/Pearl Harbor

• Hideki Tojo, militant army officer, rose to power in Japan in October of 1941

Japan/Pearl Harbor

• Thanks to code-breaking the U.S. knew Japan was planning an attack…but didn’t know when

• Japan hoped to cripple America’s Pacific Fleet & achieve goals before U.S. Navy could recover

Japan/Pearl Harbor

• Attacked at 7 AM on December 7, 1941

• A Sunday

• Japanese airplanes were detected on radar, but ignored

• W/in an hour 180 planes had arrived

• ½ of the Pacific Fleet was located there

• Attack was over by 9:45 AM

• 2,400 Americans killed

• 200 warplanes damaged/destroyed

• 18 warships sunk/damaged

• Japan lost only 29 planes

Japan/Pearl Harbor

• FDR declared war on Japan the next day.

• “A date which will live in infamy.”

• Germany & Italy declared war on the U.S. on December 11, 1941