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Peace at Last

Peace at Last. Chapter 26, Section 5. Truman knew little about ending the war or plans for postwar peace Weeks after he took office Germany surrendered Allies then turned their attention to defeating Japan. Island Hopping in the Pacific. The U.S. had two main goals in the Pacific War

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Peace at Last

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  1. Peace at Last Chapter 26, Section 5

  2. Truman knew little about ending the war or plans for postwar peace • Weeks after he took office Germany surrendered • Allies then turned their attention to defeating Japan

  3. Island Hopping in the Pacific • The U.S. had two main goals in the Pacific War • 1. Regain the Philippines • 2. Invade Japan • For its plan to work the U.S. had to control the Pacific Ocean • Island hopping: capturing some Japanese islands and going around to others • Islands were used as stepping stones toward Japan

  4. A deadly routine • American ships shelled a Japanese held island • Troops waded ashore under heavy gunfire • Then hand-to-hand fighting • By 1945 General McArthur and troops had taken back Manila, the capital of the Philippines • Americans then captured the islands of Iwo Jima and Okinawa, just 350 miles from the Japanese home islands

  5. Closing in on Japan • The Japanese fought back intensely • Japanese pilots carried out kamikaze attacks • Loaded old planes with bombs • Pilots then deliberately crashed planes in to Allied ships

  6. Closing in on Japan • April 1945 American bombers were pounding Japanese factories and cities • American warships bombarded the coast and sank ships • The Japanese were suffering • Still their leaders talked about winning a glorious victory over the allies • U.S. military warned that to invade Japan might cost over a million casualties

  7. Defeat of Japan • July 1945 Allied leaders, Truman, Churchill, and Stalin met at Potsdam, Germany • Truman received new that American scientists had successfully tested a new weapon, the atomic bomb • A single bomb could destroy an entire city

  8. Using the atomic bomb • Potsdam Declaration: Allied leaders sent Japan a message to surrender or face prompt and utter destruction • Japanese leaders did not know about the atomic bomb • They ignored the Allied message

  9. Using the atomic bomb • August 6th 1945 the Enola Gray, an American bomber dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan • Killed 70,000 people and injured an equal number • Destroyed 80% of the city

  10. Using the atomic bomb • Two days later the Soviet Union declared war on Japan • Japan did not surrender • August 9, 1945 the U.S. dropped a second atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan • 40,000 people died • Later more people died in both Nagasaki and Hiroshima from the effects of the atomic radiation

  11. Japan surrenders • V-J Day, Victory over Japan: August 14, 1945: After a furious debate in the Japanese cabinet, the emperor announced that the nation would surrender

  12. Counting the Costs • News of Japan surrender sparked wild celebrations across the U.S.

  13. The death toll • Deadliest in human history • The exact number of casualties will probably never be known • Estimated between 30 and 60 million people were killed in battle or behind the lines

  14. WWII was different then WWI, which had been fought mostly in trenches • WWII planes bombed cities and towns destroying houses roads, bridges, railroads, factories, farms • 1945 millions were homeless and had no way to earn a living

  15. Mistreatment of prisoners • Stories trickled out about the mistreatment of prisoners • Bataan Death March: After the Japanese captured the Philippines they forced about 60,000 American and Filipino prisoners to march 100 miles with little food or water • 10,000people were died or were killed

  16. The Holocaust • Allies also heard about Nazi death camps • Holocaust: Hitler’s policy of killing Jews • Nazi’s imprisoned Jews from Germany, Poland, and other nations they conquered • Tortured, starved, and murdered more than 6 million Jews

  17. The Holocaust • Auschwitz, Maidanek, Dachau, and Treblinka Allied troops saw large gas chambers used for murder • Soldiers wept at the piles of dead and dying human bodies • Nazis murdered other groups as well as Jews • 6 millions Poles, Slavs, and Gypsies were victims of death camps • Killed prisoners of war • Killed people they considered unfit because of physical or mental disabilities

  18. War Crime Trials • Allies put Axis leaders on trial • 1945 and 1946 conducted war crime trials in Nuremberg. • Nuremberg Trials: 12 Nazi leaders were sentenced to death • Thousands others were found guilty of war crimes and imprisoned • Allies tried and executed Japanese leaders accused of war crimes

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