World War II

1. Aim: What happens when you break the rules? World War II

2. Motivation Activity • PBS Legacy of War • Viewing Questions: • What crimes were the Nazis accused of?

3. Nuremberg Trials • “The wrongs which we seek to condemn and punish have been so calculated, so malignant and so devastating, that civilization cannot tolerate their being ignored because it cannot survive their being repeated….It is hard now to perceive in these miserable men…the power by which as Nazi leaders they once dominated much the world and terrified most of it. Merely as individuals, their fate is of little consequence to the world. What makes this inquest significant is that these prisoners represent sinister influences that lurk in the world long after their bodies have returned to dust. They are living symbols of racial hatreds, of terrorism and violence, and of the arrogance and cruelty of power….Civilization can afford no compromise with the social forces which would gain renewed strength if we deal ambiguously or indecisively with the men in whom those forces now survive.” • Opening address to the Nuremberg War Crimes Trial

4. I. Crime of Waging Aggressive War • 1936: Rhineland: Treaty of Versailles demilitarized zone occupied by Hitler’s forces • 1938: Annexation of Austria • 1938: Sudentenland: part of Czechoslovakia, where most people were German-speaking • 1939: Invasion of Poland • 1940: Defeat of France • 1941: Invasion of Soviet Union Map of Nazi Occupied Europe 1941-1942

5. II. Crimes of the Battlefield • Blitzkrieg (lightning attack) in Poland, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium, France • Racial Justification: Land for the Aryan Nation

6. Vengeance-1 and V-2 Rockets • Invented in 1944 • Used to indiscriminately bomb Great Britain • Same technology used by US and Soviet Space Race in the post-war period

8. III. Crimes Against Humanity • Hitler’s “Final Solution:” policy of genocide and systematic killing of an entire population • Concentration/Death Camps

10. Group Roles • Leader: Makes sure that everyone is doing work; delegates duties and a game plan. • Scribe: Writes down answers on worksheet. • Speaker: Will share main conclusions at the end of class.

11. Activity • Should the U.S. stand trial for War Crimes? • Directions: • In group of 4, open the collection of documents. The documents discuss Japanese internment, the firebombing of Dresden/Tokyo and the dropping of the Atomic Bomb. • Divide the work amongst your group and individually analyze the documents. Each document has guiding questions to help you analyze. • Go around the group and share your conclusions about your documents. • Based on the documents, answer the question on the final worksheet together. • Presentations: Present your groups findings at the end of class.

12. December 7, 1941 Attack on Pearl Harbor

13. Firebombing • Dresden, Germany (Feb. 13th-14th 1945) • Tokyo, Japan (March 9, 1945) • Bombing at night to kill civilian population • Strategic bombing to break morale

14. Japanese Internment • Blamed for Pearl Harbor • 127,000 on West Coast (none on Hawaii) interned by Executive Order 9066 • 60,000 American citizens

15. Hiroshima

16. Nagasaki

17. Underlying Causes of World War II • War begets War • Failures of WWI’s Treaty of Versailles • Weimar Republic in Germany • Worldwide Depression • The Rise of Fascism • Fascism: stresses nationalism over individualism • Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler • Japanese imperialism and aggression