D-Day Normandy France

• June 6th 1944– 2 million troops – 5,000 ships– 11,000 aircraft

• Allies deception / Patton’s Fake Army • Hitler believed the deception and pulled tank

units

Nazi Counteroffensive

• French retake Paris August 5, 1944• German Counterattack Belgium’s Ardennes

Forest Winter 1944– Americans caught by surprise– Desperate battle– Shortage of fuel– Frozen ground – 70-100,000 US Casualties

Yalta Conference• February of 1945 Churchill, Stalin, and Roosevelt met (Russia)• Terms of Agreement

a. Russia enter war against Japan after Germany defeatedb. Creation of United Nations c. Russia regain territories lost to Japan in Russo-Japanese

War plus special rights in Manchuria d. Free elections to be held to establish democracies in those nations formerly occupied by Nazie. Germany was to be divided into British, American, French, and Soviet zones of oc cupation

End of War in Europe

• 1945- US steps up bombing campaign on Germany

• Dresden firebombed – 1,400 Allied planes – City reduced to rubble – 135,000 died

• April- Russians attack Berlin • Hitler’s Suicide• May 7th Germans surrender

Bataan Death March

• US forces surrender to Japanese

• 70,000 troops marched sixty miles – Intense heat – Little water or food

• 5,000 to 11,000 American and Filipino died

Battle of Midway

• June 1942• Japanese Seek to destroy last US carriers• Set a trap at Midway Island• US broke Japanese radio code• US dive-bombers catch Japanese rearming

Guadalcanal

• Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands, NE of Australia • 1st of many bloody battles in the Pacific• Island Hopping Campaign– Stepping-stones for eventual invasion of Japanese

main islands– Unnecessary to defeat Japanese on every island – Goal: secure islands so US bombers can attack the

Japanese main islands

Bloody Island Battles• Battle of Tarawa

– 2 mile long and half mile wide island

• 18,000 US Marines vs.

• 4,500 Japanese– 17 Japanese survive,

• US: 2,000 wounded 1,000 died

• Continue Island hopping - Saipan, Guam and Tinian

Island Air Bases

• B-29 Superfortress Bombers– Faster, higher and farther with heavier bomb loads

• March 9-10th 1945: B-29’s bomb Tokyo with Napalm– Gelatinized gasoline- start fires hard to extinguish– 250,000 pounds of Napalm dropped – Japanese homes/buildings made of wood and paper – Estimated 100,000 Japanese die – 1 million homeless – 16 square miles of Tokyo destroyed

The Philippines

• General Douglas MacArthur’s vow

• Battle of Leyte Gulf• Kamikaze suicide attacks– Sank 400 ships – Nearly 10,000 Americans

die• June 1945 recapture of

Philippines complete

Okinawa a Prelude• Japanese Home Territory

– 350 miles from Kyushu– Staging ground for the invasion

• 183,000 Americansvs.

• 77,000 Japanese, 20,000 Okinawans– Battle lasted 82 days– US lost 12,000 – Japanese lost 70,000 – 100,000 to 150,000 civilians– Civilian Suicides– Kichiku - ogre-beasts

Atomic Secret

• April 12th FDR suffered a massive cerebral hemorrhage and died

• The Manhattan Project 1942 • 1st atomic bomb successfully detonated

Alamogordo, New Mexico July 16th

The “Little Boy” and “Fat Man”

• August 6th 1945 • Japanese Industrial city of Hiroshima– 70,000 Japanese citizens vaporized– 100,000 Japanese injured– 98% of the buildings destroyed – 100,000 perished from burns and radiation sickness

• August 9th

• Nagasaki Naval Port City– 80,000 people died from blast and radiation

Harry S. Truman, Diary, July 25, 1945We have discovered the most terrible bomb in the history of the world. It may be the fire destruction prophesied in the Euphrates Valley Era, after Noah and his fabulous Ark.Anyway we "think" we have found the way to cause a disintegration of the atom. An experiment in the New Mexico desert was startling - to put it mildly. Thirteen pounds of the explosive caused the complete disintegration of a steel tower 60 feet high, created a crater 6 feet deep and 1,200 feet in diameter, knocked over a steel tower 1/2 mile away and knocked men down 10,000 yards away. The explosion was visible for more than 200 miles and audible for 40 miles and more.This weapon is to be used against Japan between now and August 10th. I have told the Sec. of War, Mr. Stimson, to use it so that military objectives and soldiers and sailors are the target and not women and children. Even if the Japs are savages, ruthless, merciless and fanatic, we as the leader of the world for the common welfare cannot drop that terrible bomb on the old capital or the new. He and I are in accord. The target will be a purely military one and we will issue a warning statement asking the Japs to surrender and save lives. I'm sure they will not do that, but we will have given them the chance. It is certainly a good thing for the world that Hitler's crowd or Stalin's did not discover this atomic bomb. It seems to be the most terrible thing ever discovered, but it can be made the most useful...Truman quoted in Robert H. Ferrell, Off the Record: The Private Papers of Harry S. Truman (New York: Harper and Row, 1980) pp. 55-56. Truman's writings are in the public domain.

Japan Surrenders

• Hirohito chooses total surrender

• August 14th 1945 fighting in Pacific ends

• September 2nd General MacArthur accepts surrender of Japan

Did America have to drop the atomic bomb to end the war with Japan?